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Britain's Largest 'Sea Dragon' Discovered at Water Reserve
The fossilized skeleton of a giant ichthyosaur, or "sea dragon", has been described as the "paleontological discovery of a lifetime" by a team at the Rutland Water Nature Reserve. (Credit: Anglian Water via Storyful)
It’s being called the "paleontological discovery of a lifetime" after the fossilized skeleton of a giant ichthyosaur, or "sea dragon," was unearthed in the United Kingdom.
The Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust said team leader Joe Davis found the Jurassic giant at the Rutland Water Nature Reserve in August 2021, with the site excavated by scientists and volunteers.
Anglian Water recently released footage of the discovery. The company manages the reserve in partnership with the wildlife trust.
According to the National History Museum in London, ichthyosaurs first appeared approximately 250 million years ago and went extinct around 90 million years ago. The marine reptiles could grow to 25 meters in length.
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Wildlife officials said the remains at the Rutland site are about 180 million years old and measured 10 meters in length, with a skull that weighs approximately one ton.
"It is a truly unprecedented discovery and one of the greatest finds in British palaeontological history," the leader of the excavation, Dr. Dean Lomax, said.
Excavations aren't uncommon.
In July 2021, a new dinosaur fossil was found in the state of Oregon. Excavators discovered a fossilized dinosaur vertebra and they believe it is roughly 103 million years old, according to The Times-Journal. The remarkable find reportedly took place on June 24 and came from a fossil dig that’s been sponsored by the University of Oregon.
FOX News contributed to this report. This story was reported from Los Angeles.