This 60-degree cliff is one of the ways for rock climbers to “conquer” the Gele Mountain. As they climbed with their bare hands, no one noticed that right next to their hands lie a pile of “footprints” made 190 million years ago.
These were Kayentapus of carnivorous dinosaurs, which were left by Dilophosaurus, the overlord at that time, also the star dinosaur in movies, who lived in the early Jurassic period.
Recently, Xing Lida, a Chinese paleontologist and an associate professor of China University of Geosciences, specially came to Chongqing with his team members to explore these footprints.
After on-site investigations, Xing Lida claimed that these Kayentapus were the first discovery of early Jurassic carnivorous dinosaur footprint fossils in China.
“Such a large amount of dinosaur footprint fossils found in a main district of a large city is rare in the world.”
Rock climbers found these special footprints incidentally when they got lost
Led by the finder Jing Suixin, the reporter moved forward along these mossy flagstones, which seems like a much less traveled path.
“If I hadn’t gone wrong when I was climbing, I couldn’t find these dinosaur footprint fossils.” Jing Suixin said that for ordinary climbers, they would barely climb there. Only rock climbers would choose this path to “conquer” Gele Mountain.
“My friend and I had come to this cliff by mistake. When we were trying to climb it with our bare hands, I noticed the footprints left by some animals on the rocks.” Jing Suixin, a graduate of geology major, shot the footprint with his mobile phone instantly.
It can provide vital clues for the research of dinosaurs of the early Jurassic Period
Jing Suixin send these photos to Xing Lida, a dinosaur footprint expert in Beijing, through WeChat immediately when he went home.
“I guess that whether these footprints are dinosaurs’. Professor Xing gave me a clear answer after watching these photos, that is, these are carnivorous dinosaurs’ footprints.”
On July 5th, after checking these on-site photos and videos, Xing Lida came to Chongqing with his team members by air and went to the discovery site immediately.
They took photos, measured, mapped and checked geological survey data. Finally, Xing Lida gave the answer that these are the footprints of carnivorous dinosaurs, which were made in the early Jurassic period and their owners were overlords on the earth at that time. This is the first discovery of their footprints found in China.
“Most dinosaur fossils belong to the middle-late Jurassic period and the Cretaceous period. Fossils of the early Jurassic period are rare. The discovery of Kayentapus provided significant clues for the study of dinosaurs of the early Jurassic period.” Xing Lida said so.