Paleontologists have uncovered the world’s first known trackway left by a fully grown Tyrannosaurus rex, consisting of four connected footprints in the badlands of southwestern North Dakota near the Montana border. Detailed in a paper published this week in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, the discovery provides unprecedented insight into the animal’s movement, as only two isolated adult T. rex footprints had previously been confirmed globally in New Mexico and Montana. Discovered in 2025 by volunteer amateur fossil hunter and high school teacher Kent Hups on U.S. Forest Service land near Marmarth, the 23-foot-long trackway features three-toed prints measuring about 3 feet each. Researchers calculated that the dinosaur traveled at a walking speed of 3.5 to 4.5 mph despite weighing over seven tons, identifying the maker through the size and shape of the prints as well as the abundance of local tyrannosaur bones, such as the ‘Teen Rex’ found nearby in 2022. Following 3D scanning by the Denver Museum of Nature & Science and analysis by lead author Peter Falkingham of Liverpool John Moores University, three of the four footprints will be airlifted by helicopter this autumn to the Denver museum. Dating back approximately 66.5 million years to the close of the Cretaceous period, the tracks represent one of the final journeys made by a T. rex before the asteroid impact that led to the extinction of the dinosaurs.
Source: cbsnews.com
