“Most things found in Australia in terms of dinosaurs have a very good chance of being new to science because of the nature of how we’ve been separated from Gondwana and South America for so long,” Robyn Mackenzie, director and paleontologist of the Eromanga Natural History Museum, told Australia’s 9 News. Gondwana was an ancient supercontinent that comprised present-day India, Africa, Arabia, Australia, Antarctica, Madagascar, and South America, according to Britannica.
“It’s very exciting…it’s most probably going to be the nation’s youngest dinosaur,” Mackenzie added.
The remains that have been recovered so far primarily consist of vertebrae, the bony components of the spine. However, Mackenzie’s team is optimistic about their chances of finding additional sections of the skeleton because they have only dug a meter (about 3.3 feet) down so far. Completing the dig could take three to five years, according to 9 News.
Based on preliminary observations of the bones, the team believed that the dinosaur was likely a sauropod, which Mackenzie defined as “a large plant-eating dinosaur.” Distinguished by their long necks, small heads, and stocky legs, sauropods remain the biggest animals to ever walk the earth, according to Britannica.
The remains were discovered at a site that Mackenzie’s son and daughter-in-law located in 2018.
Eromanga has yielded a large number of prehistoric relics. Local excavation sites are “some of the richest dinosaur fields in Australia,” Mackenzie said. In 2007, paleontologists found the remains of a 30-meter-long and 6.5-meter-tall titanosaur at one, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Nicknamed “Cooper,” the remains are on display at the Eromanga Natural History Museum.
“Over the past 17 years, many sites have been found. Slowly, each year, we go through each site,” Mackenzie said. “Because soils of the right age are exposed, we’ve actually found the dinosaur bones on top of the soil. That’s the key to finding more bones beneath the ground.”
