Paleontologists find an allosaurus snout on Children's Museum's dinosaur dig

Paleontologists on a Wyoming dig led by The Children's Museum have discovered a rarity: the almost intact snout of an allosaurus.

While digging with a piece of construction equipment, site manager Hamilton Timmons lifted a block of rock that contained the specimen, according to a news release from the museum. The team then gingerly extracted it without shattering the bones.

“With a sound plan in place, we went for it, flipped the block over and you could see exactly what we had," stated Laura Rooney, the museum's paleontology curator, in the release. "The release of emotions was something I’ve never felt. Everyone was screaming, I was crying and it was the most exciting thing I’ve ever witnessed—knowing that we found something in better condition than anyone dreamed of."

The snout belongs to the same predator the museum's team found in 2020 . Over the next few years, paleontologists located more of the dinosaur with its bones "articulated" — or, fossilized in the same order as when it was alive. That means that after the allosaurus died, it was buried before water, decay and scavengers moved in, according to the release.

Paleontologists are working on the bones at the museum's Polly H. Hix Paleo Prep Lab and R.B. Annis Mission Jurassic Paleo Lab. Museum visitors also can view the block containing the allosaurus' legs in a case in front of the Annis lab.

But the predator has more to offer than just its bones.

"Other Allosaurus have been found with skin impressions, but this one contains skin from parts of the body yet to be preserved—making it even more fascinating. In addition, the skin is far more abundant than other discoveries of skin based on published material,” the museum's lead paleontologist Joseph Frederickson stated in the release.

The dinosaur is courtesy of Mission Jurassic, a project for which the museum has leased a plot of land outside Cody, Wyoming, in the Big Horn Basin. There, paleontologists from the museum and partners Naturalis Biodiversity Center and University of Manchester have dug up land and sea creatures and trackways. The Children's Museum and Naturalis Biodiversity Center are continuing to work at the site.

This dino surprised paleontologists: You can see it at The Children's Museum

Many finds, including two 65-foot-long sauropods, have already been added to The Children's Museum's revamped Dinosphere exhibition . Paleontologists began digging on the plot in 2017, and IndyStar visited the site in 2019 to report on the process .

This summer, the museum is inviting families out to the site to meet paleontologists and dig for fossils. More information about the trip and cost is at childrensmuseum.org/exhibits/dinosphere/dino-digs .

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Contact IndyStar reporter Domenica Bongiovanni at 317-444-7339 or d.bongiovanni@indystar.com. Follow her on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter: @domenicareports.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Paleontologists find an allosaurus snout on Children's Museum's dinosaur dig