Parts of dinosaur fossils

CHONGQING (CQNEWS) -- Have you ever seen the film Jurassic Park and remembered the dinosaurs? Recently, the Chongqing Municipal Bureau of Planning and Natural Resources organized a media open day related to dinosaur fossil restoration to uncover the secrets of the earth hundreds of millions of years ago.

The fossils of three giant dinosaurs with different postures were placed in the Fossil Restoration Center of Chongqing Geo-heritage Protection and Research Laboratory. "The biggest pieced dinosaur in Chongqing reaches 24 meters long," said Dr. Dai Hui, chief engineer and senior engineer of 208 Geo-heritage Protection Institute of Chongqing Bureau of Geology and Minerals Exploration while pointing to the three dinosaurs. Fossils with 40% integrity were discovered in Hechuan in 2015.

Dai told that the Mamenchisauridae dinosaurs has been restored based on the fossil prototype in a ratio of 1:1, and the fossils excavated on site are not equipped with 100% perfect structure, so its repair took nearly two years.

Practiced technicians are removing rocks from fossils via fine trimming.

The finished dinosaur form can be seen only after the fossils with surrounding rocks are packed at the excavation site, then dismantled at the Fossil Restoration Center, removed the surrounding rocks in rough trimming by fossil restorers, and done something like fine trimming, models making and mounting. “These processes ask technicians to be with great skill so most of them have worked in fossil restoration for more than ten or twenty years.” As time goes by, many fossils will be consolidated with the rocks. As a result, restorers need to exactly distinguish the rocks and fossils without any mistakes while restoring.

Fossil restorers are making models based on prototypes.

"Although we cannot see the real dinosaurs, by excavating, restoring and studying dinosaur fossils, we hope more people know the mystery of the earth and this species.” Dai said that fossils in Chongqing are widely distributed and abundant, because hundreds of millions of years ago, Chongqing provided dinosaurs a good living environment full of swamps and lakes, with hot and humid climate, dense forests and shrubs along the banks. As a consequence, dinosaur fossils were found successively in Hechuan, Qianjiang, Qijiang and Beibei, and last year, a 150-meter-long dinosaur fossil wall was excavated in Yunyang.

The worker from Restoration Center said that a large number of dinosaur fossils excavated previously in Chongqing has been restoring and more dinosaur forms are to be showed to the public after repairing and researching. (Translated by Jiang Yuling, Fathom Language Limited)