Steven Spielberg’s fourth installment of the Jurassic Park franchise is crushing box offices like an angry apatosaurus, simultaneously igniting the imagination of millions while ensuring there may never be another non-sequel screenplay ever written. Credo’s Topic Pages are a great way to sort through the leviathan-sized piles of dinosaur-related information out there without spending entire epochs finding what you need.
Tyrannosaurus - People used to believe T. Rex was the largest carnivorous dinosaur, but in 1995 Giganotosaurus carolinii happened, and in 1996 a 45-foot long Carcharodontosaurus saharicus was unearthed from the Moroccan Sahara. Poor little 39-foot long T. Rex.
Pterosaur - Pterosaurs were flying high with their “Silent P” trend, however the fossil record suggests they never caught on to the feathers some of their contemporaries were sporting. These winged lizards varied in size from the smallest genera who were the size of a sparrow to Quetzalcoatlus, which may have boasted a wingspan up to 60-feet in width.
Ichthyosaur - “Ichthyosaur” isn’t Greek for “Nightmare Dolphin,” but it should be. These marine reptiles were usually 2-3 meters long, but in 2004 Norwegian scientists found a 5-meter long fossil on the island of Svalbard.
