New species of killer dinosaur discovered in Utah
Scientists have discovered a killer dinosaur that roamed in what is now Utah some 100 million years ago.
Experts say the discovery provides insight into the top predators in North America before T. rex showed up.
The two-legged beast was more than 30 feet long and weighed more than 4 tons.
The new species, named Siats meekerorum, is believed to be the third-largest carnivore ever found in North America. Only a partial skeleton has been pieced together from bones first spotted in a Utah rock formation in 2008.
The discovery helps fill a gap in the fossil record of North American big predators before the arrival of the group including T. rex. It wasn't related to that famous dinosaur.
Researchers from the Field Museum in Chicago and the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh announced the finding Friday in the journal Nature Communications.The name Siats meekerorum is taken from a legend of Utah's Ute tribe and the name of a family of donors to the Field Museum.