New Evidence From Dinosaur Footsteps Show Massive Herds Once Roamed North...( Fairbanks Alaska - A joint University...)

Fairbanks, Alaska - A joint University of Alaska Fairbanks/Anchorage expedition team has discovered a significant variety of single dinosaur footprints and sets of prints, or trackways, on Alaska's North Slope.

Faculty and students from the University of Alaska Museum along with team members from the UAF and UAA geology departments collected casts and impressions of five different types of dinosaurs in the foothills of Alaska's Brooks Range during the summer 1998 field season. A total of 13 new track sites were located along a 75-mile stretch of the Colville River in National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.

The presence of the newly discovered tracks, trackways and trampled surfaces are at least 25-million years older than the well-known dinosaur bone beds farther to the north. This discovery provides the first direct evidence that dinosaurs were numerous and diverse in the Arctic 90-110 million years ago.

Previously, there was only one, poorly documented trackway on the Alaskan Peninsula. "This summer, we found dinosaur tracks from meat and plant eating, duckbilled and armored dinosaurs," said Roland Gangloff, curator of earth sciences at the UA Museum. "Now we know dinosaurs flourished in Alaska even earlier than our previous work had indicated," he said.

The largest track is 18 inches long and contains three large toe impressions made by a carnivorous dinosaur, possibly a member of the tyrannosaur family.

"The most surprising thing was finding four-toed tracks suggestive of armored or horned dinosaurs," said Gangloff. "We also found tracks that showed the pebbly texture of the animal's skin, which are extremely rare."

Most of the tracks found are three-toed and represent the movements of the early duckbill dinosaurs or their ancestors. One of the tracks is yet to be identified. The mystery footprints, discovered and repeated throughout the middle of the trackway, are smaller, oval in shape and lack toe impressions.
'"/>

Contact: Debra Damron
fynews@uaf.edu
907-474-7122
University of Alaska Fairbanks/NOAA Sea Grant Program
14-Sep-1998