Traces of ‘dinosaur highway’ dating back 166 million years discovered in England

• A “dinosaur road” containing almost 200 footprints dating back 166 million years has been discovered in southern England.
• Some footprints show the paths followed by Cetiosaurus, a dinosaur that grew to almost 60 feet long. Another set belonged to Megalosaurus, a 30-foot predator and the first dinosaur to be scientifically named two hundred years ago.
• The findings will be displayed in a new exhibition at Oxford University’s Natural History Museum and will be broadcast on the BBC’s “Digging for Britain” program next week.

A worker excavating clay at a limestone quarry in southern England noticed unusual potholes that led to the discovery of a “dinosaur road” and nearly 200 footprints dating back 166 million years, researchers said Thursday.

The extraordinary find, made after a team of more than 100 people excavated the Dewars Farm quarry in Oxfordshire in June, adds to the above paleontology work in the area and offers greater insight into the Middle Jurassic period, researchers from the universities of Oxford and Birmingham said.

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“These footprints offer an extraordinary window into the life of dinosaursrevealing details about their movements, interactions and the tropical environment they inhabited,” said Kirsty Edgar, professor of micropaleontology at the University of Birmingham.

Workers gather around five extensive trails that were part of a “dinosaur highway” at Dewars Farm Quarry in Oxfordshire, England. (University of Birmingham via AP)

Four of the sets of footprints that make up the so-called highway show paths taken by gigantic, long-necked herbivores called sauropods, believed to be Cetiosaurus, a dinosaur that grew to nearly 60 feet long. A fifth group belonged to the Megalosaurus, a ferocious 30-foot predator that left a distinctive triple-claw imprint and was the first dinosaur to receive a scientific name two centuries ago.

An area where tracks intersect raises questions about possible interactions between carnivores and herbivores.

“Megalosaurus has been known and studied by scientists longer than any other dinosaur on Earth, and yet these recent discoveries demonstrate that there is still new evidence of these animals, waiting to be found,” said Emma Nicholls, vertebrate paleontologist. at the Natural History Museum of the University of Oxford.

Nearly 30 years ago, 40 sets of footprints discovered in a local limestone quarry were considered one of the most scientifically important dinosaur footprint sites in the world. But that area is virtually inaccessible now and there is limited photographic evidence because it predates the use of digital cameras and drones to record finds.

Workers carefully study dinosaur footprints found at Dewars Farm Quarry in Oxfordshire, England. (Emma Nicholls/OUMNH via AP)

The group working on the site this summer took more than 20,000 digital images and used drones to create three-dimensional models of the impressions. The abundant documentation will help future studies and could shed light on the size of the dinosaurs, how they walked and the speed at which they moved.

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“The preservation is so detailed that we can see how the mud deformed as the dinosaur’s legs moved in and out,” said Duncan Murdock, an earth scientist at the Oxford museum. “Together with other fossils such as burrows, shells and plants, we can bring to life the muddy lagoon environment that dinosaurs walked through.”

The findings will be displayed in a new exhibition at the museum and will also be broadcast on the BBC’s “Digging for Britain” program next week.