Fossil of monster dinosaur found in West Country
Spanning 25 metres long the ichthyosaur would've been the apex predator of the ocean
Last updated 18th Apr 2024
The fossilised remains of a gigantic dinosaur which scientists say would have been THE apex predator of the ocean, have been discovered in the West Country.
Father and daughter team, Justin and Ruby Reynolds from Braunton in Devon, first discovered the 2 metre jawbone in May 2020, while searching for fossils on the beach at Blue Anchor in Somerset.
Realising the significance of the find, they contacted palaeontologist Dr Dean Lomax from the University of Bristol who had examined a similar find in 2016.
Together with him the bones of both discoveries have now been identified as the jaws of an enormous new species of ichthyosaur, with the latest individual estimated to have been around 25m long.
Dr Dean Lomax said: “I was amazed by the find. In 2018, my team (including Paul de la Salle who made the 2016 discovery) studied and described Paul’s giant jawbone and we had hoped that one day another would come to light.
"This new specimen is more complete, better preserved, and shows that we now have two of these giant bones (called a surangular) that have a unique shape and structure. I became very excited, to say the least.”
Justin and Ruby, (who was then just 11 years old) together with Paul, Dr Lomax, and several family members, visited the site to hunt for more pieces of this rare discovery.
In time, the team found additional pieces of the same jaw which fit together perfectly, like a multimillion-year-old jigsaw.
Justin commented: “When Ruby and I found the first two pieces we were very excited as we realised that this was something important and unusual. When I found the back part of the jaw, I was thrilled because that is one of the defining parts of Paul's earlier discovery.”
The last piece of bone was recovered in October 2022.
The team have called the new genus and species Ichthyotitan severnensis, meaning “giant fish lizard of the Severn.” It's thought it would have had giant teeth, allowing it to eat more or less anything it came across.
"There's no doubt in my mind that this would've been a top of the food chain predator," Dr Lomax told Absolute Radio.
"This is the sort of thing that would've been predating on pretty much anything that it chose. It would've been twice as long as a T-Rex without a doubt."
Thankfully for us, the species went extinct around 200 million years ago and today the bones represent the very last of their kind.
Ichthyotitan is not the world’s first giant ichthyosaur, but de la Salles’ and Reynolds’ discoveries are unique among those known to science. These two bones appear roughly 13 million years after their latest geologic relatives, including Shonisaurus sikanniensis from British Columbia, Canada, and Himalayasaurus tibetensis from Tibet, China.
Commenting on the research, Dr Lomax added: “I was highly impressed that Ruby and Justin correctly identified the discovery as another enormous jawbone from an ichthyosaur.
"They recognised that it matched the one we described in 2018. I asked them whether they would like to join my team to study and describe this fossil, including naming it. They jumped at the chance.
"For Ruby, especially, she is now a published scientist who not only found but also helped to name a type of gigantic prehistoric reptile. There are probably not many 15-year-olds who can say that! A Mary Anning in the making, perhaps.”
The new research has been published in the open access journal PLOS ONE, the same journal that published the first study in 2018.
Ruby, Justin and Paul’s discoveries will soon go on display at the Bristol Museum and Art Gallery.