Re: Update on new old bones

[xm9@sdcc12.UCSD.EDU (richard g. adair)]

> I'm a curious amateur dinosaur fan.  I seem to recall a news item back a 
> few years now that announced the discovery of some really huge bones that 
> indicated a sauropod much larger than any perviously known.  If memory 
> serves, the names ultrasaur and seismosaur were used.  I don't recall 
> having heard any follow up since then.  Could anybody bring me up to 
> speed on the status of these animals?
> 
> Joe Sexton

My recollection, from the Dinosaur Data book, is that Ultrasaurus is
an unofficial name because a smaller saurapod found in Korea has
precedence on it. As far as finds, I think the Dry Mesa Quarry, in
West Colorado near the Utah border, is the source of most, if not
all, Ultrasaurus bones. I just returned from a vacation that took me
to Provo and Price, Utah, and the BYU earth science museum had on
display the scapula of what the museum personnel claim make it the
longest and largest dino yet found. This is the scapula that was
seen on the dino series that Walter Cronkite hosted a couple of
years ago.

Re: Seismosaurus, the journal Geophysics, published by the Society
of Exploration Geophysics, contains an article in the January, 1992,
issue, co-authored by Dave Gillette, which describes the seismic
tomographic imaging of the seismosaurus remains in a sandstone hill side.
This was an interesting application of technology developed with
Oak Ridge, TN, funding to locate buried, forgotten barrels of toxic waste.
I'm virtually certain that this was the inspiration for the acoustic
imaging of the deinonychus in the opening sequence of the movie
Jurassic Park.  If only the exquisite resolution they showed in the
movie were possible!

regards

rick adair