The gigantic fossilized remains include vertebrae with a diameter of over 1 meter and thigh bones up to 2 meters long, indicating that this new monster species was at least the size of a basketball court when it was alive.
According to Live Science, the newly discovered creature has been named Garumbatitan morellensis, belonging to the lineage of the largest creatures to ever walk the continents: the titanosaurs, the largest group within the sauropod dinosaurs.
The excavation of the great fossil remains – (Photo: GBE-UNED)
Garumbatitan morellensis lived in what is now Spain around 122 million years ago, during the Early Cretaceous period.
This fossilized skeleton includes several unusually shaped bones, distinct from other known sauropod dinosaurs, which may provide clues about the evolutionary history of a completely different branch.
“Portrait” of the new giant creature – (Graphic: Grup Guix)
The years-long excavation at the Sant Antono de la Vespa site near the city of Morella in Spain has uncovered at least three specimens of Garumbatitan morellensis.
The skeletons include gigantic vertebrae measuring up to 1 meter in diameter, extremely long thigh bones up to 2 meters, and two complete foot skeletons.
In a description of the creature published in the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, researchers from the Evolutionary Biology Group of the National University of Distance Education (GBE-UNED) stated that it is very difficult to accurately estimate the size of these monsters, but they must be at least the size of a basketball court (28×15 m).
The study of these previously unknown gigantic creatures has only just begun.
Previously, the heaviest known titanosaur belonged to an unnamed species, with remains discovered in 2021 in Argentina, potentially weighing over 70 tons.
Meanwhile, the longest titanosaur ever identified belongs to a species known as Supersaurus, measuring 39 meters in length.
