![]() "Its neck is arched, its head sticking up, its arms out-stretched to the sides. The fossil preserved a tragic moment for posterity. "The fact there were so many of them is a testament to just how well the dinosaurs were doing right up until the end," Brusatte added. The discovery of Tongtianlong and five other oviraptorosaur species in southern China showed this group was still blossoming and diversifying during the last few million years before an asteroid struck Earth about 66 million years ago, wiping out the dinosaurs, Brusatte said. ![]() Paleontologist Steve Brusatte of Scotland's University of Edinburgh, who worked on the study published in the journal Scientific Reports, said the fossil adds to the understanding of dinosaur evolution on the eve of destruction. It was a member of a group called oviraptorosaurs, one of the closest relatives to birds, which evolved earlier from small, feathered dinosaurs. ![]() The Cretaceous Period creature, called Tongtianlong limosus, lived 66 to 72 million years ago, at the twilight of the dinosaurs' more than 160-million-year reign on Earth. Workmen blasting bedrock while building a school near the city of Ganzhou unearthed a beautifully preserved fossil of the roughly 6.5-foot-long dinosaur, nicknamed the "Mud Dragon," still in that contorted position, scientists said on Thursday. ![]() WASHINGTON-In a humid, tropical jungle in southern China eons ago, a remarkably bird-like dinosaur with wing-like arms, a toothless beak and a dome-shaped crest atop its head became trapped in mud, struggled in vain to escape and died. ![]()
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