A new member of the largest family of giant monsters ever to walk the continents has been discovered in an oasis in the Western Desert of Egypt.
According to Sci-News, the fossil of this monster revealed 5 vertebrae and 12 appendages, allowing paleontologists to estimate that it was between 10 to 15 meters long when alive.
Fossil fragments of Igai Semkhu collected from Egypt – (Photo: JOURNAL OF VERTEBRATE PALEONTOLOGY)
The newly discovered monster has been named Igai Semkhu, belonging to the family of titanosaurids, which are known as “guardian lizards.” They are the largest dinosaurs and also the largest land animals to have ever walked the planet.
This new creature was found in the sediments of the Quseir Formation in the Kharga Oasis, located in the Western Desert of Egypt. It lived about 75 million years ago, near the end of the Cretaceous period — the golden age and also the final era of dinosaurs.
Portrait of the new monster from Egypt – (Graphic: SCI-NEWS).
Like other titanosaurids excavated in North Africa and the Arabian Peninsula, despite its size, Igai Semkhu is still considered a relatively small individual within this magnificent dinosaur family.
Some titanosaur species found in South America can reach lengths of several dozen meters and weigh nearly 70 tons.
According to a research team led by paleontologist Eric Gorscak from Ohio University (USA), this new organism further supports the hypothesis of a distinct Euro-Asian branch of Cretaceous titanosaurids, as well as the sharing of quadrupedal animal populations between North Africa and the Euro-Asian region during this period.
The unique study on Igai Semkhu has just been published in the scientific journal Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.
