A handout photograph taken by vertebrate palaeontologist, Dr Emma Nicholls, and released by the Oxford University of Natural History on January 2, 2025 (Photo by Emma NICHOLLS / Oxford University Museum of Natural History / AFP)
London: British researchers have unearthed some 200 dinosaur footprints dating back 166 million years in a find believed to be biggest in the UK.
Teams from Oxford and Birmingham Universities made the "exhilarating" discovery at a quarry in Oxfordshire in central England after a worker came across "unusual bumps" as he was stripping clay back with a mechanical digger, according to a new BBC documentary.
The site features five extensive trackways, with the longest continuous track stretching more than 150 metres (490 feet) in length.
Four of the five trackways uncovered are believed to have been made by a long-necked herbivorous dinosaur, most likely a cetiosaurus.
The fifth set of tracks likely belongs to a nine-metre long carnivorous megalosaurus known for its distinctive three-toed feet with claws, according to the University of Birmingham.
"It's rare to find them so numerous in one place and it's rare to find such extensive trackways as well," Emma Nicholls of Oxford University's Museum of Natural History told AFP.
The area could turn out to be one of the world's biggest dinosaur track sites, she added.
The discovery will feature in the BBC television documentary "Digging for Britain", due to be broadcast on January 8.
