Giant ichthyosaur was one of the largest animals ever alive (EarthSky/PLOS)
Last edited Mon May 7, 2018, 02:04 PM - Edit history (2)
By Eleanor Imster in Earth | April 25, 2018
The new discovery of a jaw bone suggests that this prehistoric aquatic reptile would have been about the size of a blue whale.
This illustration shows Shonisaurus, a 69-foot ichthyosaur similar to the newfound creature.
Photograph by Nobumichi Tamura
A recently-discovered fossil jaw bone belongs to a prehistoric aquatic reptile that was one of the largest animals ever, according to a study by an international team of paleontologists.
According to the research, published in the peer-reviewed journal PLOS One on April 9, 2018, the 205 million-year-old bone belongs to a giant ichthyosaur, which scientists estimate was about 82 feet (26 meters) in length. That’s around the size of a blue whale. Blue whales are the largest animals ever known to have existed.
Fossil collector and co-author of the study, Paul de la Salle, found the bone on the beach at Lilstock, Somerset, U.K., in May 2016. He later returned to the site and found even more pieces that together measured about 3 feet (1 meter) in length. He said in a statement:
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more: http://earthsky.org/earth/giant-ichthyosaur-dinosaur-fossil-discovery
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0194742
https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/04/prehistoric-sea-monster-largest-size-blue-whale-fossils-science/
This is especially gratifying to me, as I was long ago struck by the improbability that the largest animal ever alive should just *happen* to be alive at the present time, especially given the tremendous sizes of so many prehistoric vertebrates. So it appears it may have been just sampling error. There are many things still unknown in the fossil record.
According to the full article, there have been a number of large ichthyosaurs unearthed in China in recent years, requiring a complete reevaluation of ichthyosaur phylogenetic relationships. Ironically, I had only recently read a few chapters on ichthyosaurs in a book from 1997 -- which now seems badly outdated.
ETA: link to NatGeo which provides correct info in caption