More than 260 dinosaur footprints discovered in Brazil and Cameroon provide further evidence that South America and Africa were once connected as part of a giant continent millions of years ago, a new study suggests.
Scientists estimated the footprints were made 120 million years ago, about 600 miles (965 kilometers) apart, roughly the distance from Dallas to Nashville, on the supercontinent known as Gondwana.
Today, the fossilized traces are more than 6,000 kilometers apart, on both sides of the Atlantic, some in eastern Brazil and others in northern Cameroon.
“We determined that in terms of age, these footprints were similar,” said SMU paleontologist Louis L. Jacobs, who led the study. “In their geological and plate tectonic context, they were also similar. In terms of shape, they are almost identical.”
Because of these matching environmental conditions, scientists concluded that the creatures were walking along a corridor, or essentially a dinosaur superhighway, that ran through an area of what would later split and become two continents.
“One of the youngest and tightest geological connections between Africa and South America was the Northeast Brazilian Elbow nestled against what is now the coast of Cameroon along the Gulf of Guinea,” Jacobs said. “The two continents were continuous along this narrow strip, so animals on either side of this connection could potentially cross it.”
This corridor was covered with sediment, which allowed dinosaur footprints to be preserved for millions of years.
Although some of the footprints were likely left by dinosaurs known as ornithischians or long-necked sauropods, Diana P.
Vineyard said most of the prints were made by three-toed theropods, or dinosaurs that resemble Tyrannosaurus rex.
