Predator X

Image credits to the Natural History Museum of the University of Oslo, Norway. You can view more images here.

Taken from the Press Release:

"It has been announced in Oslo today that an international team of paleontologists have unearthed the partial skull of a 50 ft marine reptile on the remote Arctic archipelago of Svalbard . Dubbed 'Predator X', the marine reptile is a new species of pliosaur, an apex predator that patrolled the Jurassic oceans 147 million years ago. The skull, 'the jewel in the crown for paleontologists', was excavated from the Arctic permafrost during a 2-week field expedition in June 2008, led by Dr. Jørn Hurum from the Natural History Museum, University of Oslo. He was joined by eleven other expedition members, including Dr. Patrick Druckenmiller, a world authority on marine reptiles from the University of Alaska Museum of the North.

New scientific research reveals that Predator X was approximately 50ft long, weighed in at 45 tons and packed an amazing 33,000lb bite. Its anatomy, physiology and hunting strategy all point to it being the ultimate predator - the most dangerous creature to patrol the Earth's oceans."

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A documentary on Predator X produced by Atlantic Productions is scheduled to air in the US on the History channel in less than an hour. Distributed by BBC Worldwide, the documentary will also be screened in Britain, Norway, and across Europe.

Pliosaurs are not to be confused with plesiosaurs, a different subgroup of ancient carnivorous aquatic mammals characterised by their long necks. Pliosaurs instead have short necks and elongated heads. Note that plesiosaurs and pliosaurs both stem from the order Plesiosauria, an order of Mesozoic marine reptiles. They appeared in the Triassic ages and thrived in the Jurassic. The order survived until the Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction event—that is, they went out along with the dinosaurs.