Mosasaur discovered in Maastricht

This video says about itself:

29 August 2015

3 Prehistoric Sea Monsters: Predator X (Pliosaurus funkei), Megalodon, and Mosasaurus (Mosasaurus hoffmanni). These prehistoric monsters ruled the seas millions of years ago.

Yesterday, the natural history museum in Maastricht in the Netherlands did not yet want to say which huge fossil animal from the age of dinosaurs they had discovered near the local ENCI factory.

Today, at a press conference, there was more clarity.

They said it was a big mosasaur, probably a Mosasaurus hoffmanni, or a closely related species.

Mosasaurus hoffmanni was the first mosasaur ever discovered amidst much publicity in the eighteenth century, also in Maastricht. The original fossil was stolen from Maastricht by French soldiers, and brought to the Paris museum where it still is.

The newly discovered fossil is 13 meters long, 68 million years old, and is called Carlo, after the ENCI worker who first discovered it.

A twitter message from the museum says that the skull of this mosasaur (the only part of the animal recovered completely so far, though an important part) is about 10% bigger than the Paris specimen’s.

Dutch NOS TV says that probably, after the death of the mosasaur, scavenging sharks dispersed its remains. The search for other parts of the skeleton is still continuing.

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