Remains of Bus-Sized Reptile Found

Oct. 5, 2006 — Remains of an enormous Jurassic Period marine reptile, nicknamed "The Monster," were found 800 miles from the North Pole, along with a treasure trove of other unusual dinosaur-era fossils, according to the University of Oslo Natural History Museum.

With a skeleton length of 33 feet or more, the monster reptile is one of the largest pliosaurs ever discovered. Pliosaurs were marine giants that had short necks, massive heads and numerous banana-sized teeth.

Jørn H. Hurum, assistant professor of vertebrate paleontology at the University of Oslo, Norway, and his colleagues found all of the remains at the arctic archipelago of Svalbard, which appears to have been teeming with life 150 million years ago. The scientists announced their finding as a preliminary report and plan to continue excavation and preparation before publishing on the discovery.

In just two weeks, the researchers found evidence for 27 marine reptiles, and they suspect there’s more where those came from.

The fossil for the huge pliosaur was found poking out of a steep hillside.

"We have at least a vertebrate column of over 19 feet, a flipper and the skull," Hurum told Discovery News. "The rest is still inside the mountain. The animal was the top predator of its time and it had everybody on the menu."

Each of the specimen’s vertebra alone was as large as a dinner plate.

The fossil finds also included short-necked plesiosaurs and long-necked ones that possessed a tiny head at the end of what the researchers said was "a ridiculously long neck."

Additionally, the remains for six ichthyosaurs were uncovered. Ichthyosaurs resembled modern dolphins, except they had bugged-out eyes and teeth that looked like two sets of saws that could come slicing down on prey.

Ichthyosaurs possessed two sets of powerful flippers and had an upright tail fin that could propel them through the water.

Despite their uncanny resemblance to dolphins, Hurum said there was no ancestral link.

He explained, "Both are adapted from land living animals (reptiles and mammals respectively) to live in the sea where there are not a lot of (body) shapes that work. This is a very good example of parallel evolution."

At the time of their existence, the plesiosaurs and ichthyosaurs flourished in what was then a relatively warm and shallow sea that would have been situated 62 degrees north of what is now the city of Oslo.

Continental drift over the millions of years moved them to their current, chilly location that may have preserved the fossils due to the chemical composition of mud at the site.

The ancient marine reptiles did not always get along, however. One of the plesiosaurs was found with an ichthyosaur tooth embedded in one of its neck bones. This suggests the toothy dolphin-like reptile munched down on the plesiosaur and may have even killed and eaten its flesh before leaving the bones behind.

Dave Martill, a University of Portsmouth, England, paleontologist, commented that the Svalbard site is "very unusual" and the finds from there are a "bonanza."

Hurum and his team plan to return to the area for excavation work in the summer of 2007.

He said, "What we hope to find is a dinosaur in the stomach of the Monster."