RE: more ideas about falling dinosaurs

[Tim Williams <twilliams_alpha@hotmail.com>]

Sim Koning wrote:

> I've noticed that one of the things that is brought up the most regarding 
> this issue, is the fact that giant tyrannosaurs and similar theropods lack 
> long arms

Most big non-avian theropods had reasonably long arms relative to body size. 
 Aside from tyrannosaurs, there are a few exceptions: the carnotaurines had 
truly puny arms; and some 'megalosaur'-grade carnosaurs had rather short 
arms (also extremely robust, especially the forearm).  Among smaller-bodied 
non-avian theropods, the compsognathids had rather small arms; and the 
alvarezsaurs had small arms that were also highly specialized.  There are 
plenty of big theropods that had fairly long arms, including some 
ceratosaurs, spinosaurs, allosaurs, the larger dromaeosaurs, and especially 
therizinosauroids (probably not such great runners) and _Deinocheirus_ 
(likely a very-long-armed theropod, even though we don't have the rest of 
the skeleton).

> and therefore would not be able to break their fall.

Maybe that's when the prey would come in handy - to break the tyrannosaur's 
fall.  :-)  Of course, if the prey was a _Triceratops_, it could turn out 
badly for the tyrannosaur.

Cheers

Tim