Europe's Largest Predatory Dinosaur Unearthed on the Isle of Wight
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Crocodile-faced dinosaur may have been Europe's largest ever predator:
An enormous crocodile-faced, spiny-backed dinosaur that prowled what is now England roughly 125 million years ago was one of the largest predatory animals to ever stalk across Europe.
Paleontologists unearthed the remains of this behemoth on the Isle of Wight off the southern coast of England. The researchers nicknamed the newfound species the "White Rock spinosaurid," after the chalky geological layer found on the island where it was discovered. As the scientists unearthed only pieces of fossils, the animal has yet to be given an official scientific name.
The fragments are the youngest spinosaurid fossils ever found in the U.K., according to a new study, published June 9 in the journal PeerJ Life and Environment. Spinosaurids were bipedal carnivorous dinosaurs with crocodile-like skulls, slender necks and sturdy arms, and they lived during the Cretaceous period (145 million to 66 million years ago). The new species is a close relative of the older, potentially amphibious Spinosaurus, which was bigger than Tyrannosaurus rex and had a large, flattened sail extending from its back.
Spinosaurids are somewhat mysterious as few fossils of the group have been discovered. Scientists suspect that the creatures hunted in lakes, rivers and lagoons, but how they captured their quarry is a subject of debate. Some paleontologists have proposed that spinosaurids actively swam after their prey (opens in new tab), propelling themselves by swishing their large tails as modern crocodiles do. Other experts suggest the monsters behaved more like herons, wading the lagoons and jabbing their long jaws into the water to snatch up fish. Either way, the creatures were enormous, and the newly discovered White Rock spinosaurid was among the biggest.
''This was a huge animal, exceeding 10m [33 feet] in length, and judging from some of the dimensions, [it] probably represents the largest predatory dinosaur ever found in Europe,'' study lead author Chris Barker, a paleontologist at the University of Southampton in England, said in a statement. ''It's just a shame it's only known from such scant material.''
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