Identical dinosaur footprints found over 3,700 miles apart, on different continents

A team of paleontologists has discovered identical dinosaur footprints on two now-different continents, separated by thousands of miles of ocean.

The footprints, dating back to the Early Cretaceous period, were found in Brazil and Cameroon, researchers wrote in a study published Monday by the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science. The discovery shows that land-dwelling dinosaurs were able to freely cross between South America and Africa before the continents separated millions of years ago.

Earth’s transformations

Researchers found more than 260 footprints in mud and silt along ancient rivers and lakes, with more than 3,700 miles separating those in South America and Africa, according to the study. Paleontologists determined they were similar in age, shape, geological and tectonic contexts.

Dinosaurs left their footprints 120 million years ago on the back of a single horse. supercontinent The new continent, known as Gondwana, broke away from the larger land mass of Pangaea — the world’s only continent at one time, said paleontologist Louis Jacobs of Southern Methodist University.

“One of the smallest and narrowest geological connections between Africa and South America was the elbow of northeastern Brazil adjacent to what is now the coast of Cameroon along the Gulf of Guinea,” said Jacobs, the study’s lead author. “The two continents were connected along this narrow stretch, so that animals on either side of this connection could move across it.”

The continents now known as Africa and South America began to split apart about 140 million years ago, researchers say. The South Atlantic Ocean eventually filled the gap.

The basins formed as the continents pulled apart, Jacobs said; rivers flowed and lakes formed in those basins. The basins where the footprints were found can be found on both sides of the divide.

What we know about dinosaurs

Most of the footprints were made by three-toed dinosaurs, a group of carnivorous dinosaurs, the researchers said. There were also tracks left by reptiles or birds.

“The plants fed the herbivores and supported the food chain,” Jacobs said. “The muddy sediments left behind by the rivers and lakes contain dinosaur footprints, including those of carnivores, which documents that these river valleys may have provided specific pathways for life to move across continents 120 million years ago.”