Another three-toed dinosaur walked in Arhab

The preliminary investigations shows a two-legged carnivorous dinosaur's footprints.

Could you imagine yourself standing close to a dinosaur over 150 million years ago or holding his foot smiling in order to take a photo? Amazingly, you can now do just that by visiting the new two-legged dinosaur’s footprints discovered near Arhab. 

The discovery was made about 50 kilometers north of the Capital Sana’a, the new dinosaur footprints have been found by the Director of Sorwah- Arhab Archeological Protection Association, Salah Abo-Harrash, in cooperation with the Geological Survey and Mineral Recourses Board (GSMRB).

The new footprint track was viewed during a trip conducted by some students of the Yemeni College of Middle Eastern Studies (YCMES) on Thursday, November 20, who were in the area to view some previous discoveries. According to paleontologists at the Geological Museum of the GSMRB, the new footprints are of a three-toed carnivorous dinosaur that walked on its hind legs.

The Yemen Observer was there to investigate the newly discovered location of the footprints. “We need more studies to know more detailed information about this dinosaur and we can achieve this through a study of its footprints in the area. From initial investigations we can ascertain that it is a carnivorous two-legged dinosaur but we cannot determine its exact name,” said geologist Basheer al-Botaily from the GSMRB. 

The previous fossilized footprints discovered in the area were made by a herd of dinosaurs which once roamed the mudflats and revealed two different species of dinosaur. One of the sets of tracks were the footprints of a small herd of four-legged sauropod dinosaurs who were traveling in a group of about a dozen individuals of varying sizes but at the same speed. 

The other set of tracks was made by a single, two-legged ornithopod dinosaur with a distinctive footprint of three huge toes. Judging from the size of the prints and the length of its stride this ornithopod specimen was large, weighing more than 15 tons and between 6 and 7 meters long from head to tail. 

The group of sauropods, which are long-necked plant-eaters, suggests they may have been part of a family group, indicating an aspect of herding behavior that cannot always be gleaned from conventional studies of fossilized bones.

“We are trying our best to protect these fossils from the effects of erosion or tampering by the people in the area,” said Dr. Ismail N. al-Janad, chairman of GSMRB. “The GSMRB fenced off the location as a protected geological site that belongs to the Geological Museum of the GSMRB.”  

The Arabian Peninsula is generally poor in dinosaur fossils, although some of those coming from the Sultanate of Oman were identified by Anne Schulp, of the Maastricht Museum of Natural History in the Netherlandsas; possible remnants of a long-necked dinosaur originating from Yemen.

“No dinosaur trackways had been found in this area previously. It’s really a blank spot on the map,” Schulp said.

The tracks were originally discovered back in 2003 by a Yemeni journalist in the Arhab area. A later investigation conducted by Schulp and Dr. Mohammed Al-Wasabi from Sana’a University revealed that they belonged to a species called ornithopod, a large herbivorous dinosaur often referred to as the “cow of the Mesozoic”.

In 2006, the research team concluded that the shape, size and travel speed of the dinosaurs that created the footprints were characteristic to a bipedal species known as ornithopod and a quadruped dinosaur, possibly a sauropod. They are most likely preserved from an age about 150 million years ago, but remained undiscovered because they are hard to spot by untrained eyes and were partially covered by debris.

Dinosaur tracks are remarkably abundant in many areas, and provide rich sources of scientific information on dinosaur behavior, locomotion, foot anatomy, ecology, chronology, and geographic distributions. Tracks also provide clues about the social behaviors of dinosaurs, and the environment in which they lived. 

Fossil tracks allow scientists to discover critical details about dinosaurs. For instance, the fact that sauropods did not leave furrows from their tails with their footprints means these giants did not drag their lengthy tails behind them. Instead, they must have held them high off the ground, to help balance their bodies, given their equally long necks.

“These trackways help us to assemble a more detailed picture of what was happening on the southern landmasses. It’s exciting to see new paleontological data coming out of Yemen, and I think there is a lot more to discover,” said researcher Nancy Stevens, an Ohio University paleontologist, who conducted the study with Schulp and Al-Wasabi. “This international collaboration provides an exciting new window into evolutionary history from a critically under sampled region.”

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