| DINOSAURS
INVADE NAVY PIER
Chicago Tribune; Chicago, Ill.; Jan 13, 2000;
Rick Hepp, Tribune Staff Writer;
Copyright 2000 by the Chicago Tribune
Breaking News.
This story contains corrected material. The name
of Corinne Wood was misspelled in this story as
published.
For the next two months in Chicago, three crusty
dinosaurs will be making their first extended
stay in more than 135 million years.
Oops, that's cretaceous-period dinosaurs. (Sorry,
Beatles fans -- you'll have to wait for a Paul,
George and Ringo reunion tour.)
University of Chicago paleontologist Paul Sereno
unveiled the skeletons of three previously unknown
dinosaurs today that will be part of a free exhibit
opening Friday at Navy Pier.
Lt. Gov. Corinne Wood also was on hand at Navy
Pier to announce a $50,000 grant for the exhibit
from the Department of Commerce and Community
Affairs (this sentence as published has been corrected
in this text).
Visitors will be able to see the replicated skeletons
of two plant- eating sauropod, known as Jobaria
tiguidensis, and one meat-eating predator, called
Afrovenator, if they visit the Crystal Gardens
on the pier between Jan. 14 and Mar. 19.
They'll also be able to touch the 3-foot, 350-pound
femur bone that kicked off Sereno's find. Sereno
also will be on hand Saturdays and Sundays with
members of the Chicago Public Schools junior paleontologist
team to answer any dinosaur questions.
Of the two Jobarias, one is a 60-foot adult and
the other is a 40- foot juvenile that is estimated
to be 135 million years old. The smaller Jobaria
was found underneath the other in the Sahara desert
in Niger, and Sereno believes they died at the
same time. The 27- foot Afrovenator was found
a mile away.
Sereno said the two species lived in the area,
which had lush vegetation and large rivers running
through it, at the same time and that the Afrovenator
was the Jobarias' primary predator. In addition
to radiometric dating methods -- similar to carbon-dating
techniques - - that indicate the two dinosaurs
lived at the same time, Sereno said there was
empirical data that supported the theory.
"We found (the Afrovenator's) skeleton,
and its tooth and its tooth marks on the juvenile
of the Jobaria," Sereno said. A University
of Chicago undergraduate made the discovery cleaning
the fossils.
Sereno discovered the dinosaurs in 1990 after
a chieftain of the nomadic Tuareg tribe took him
to a dinosaur boneyard. What he found was a new
species of dinosaur that was so perfectly designed
for the world it lived in 130 million years ago
that it anatomically remained the same for millions
of years.
It took him and his 18-member team seven years
and two prolonged trips to get 20 tons of bones
back to Chicago. When it was over they had brought
back the most complete long-necked dinosaur ever
discovered from the cretaceous period with 95
percent of its skeleton intact.
"It was just missing a few toes," Sereno
joked.
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