Some of the most famous and best-preserved dinosaur fossils were thought to have been suspended in time due to a massive volcanic event like the Mt. Vesuvius eruption that literally froze Pompeii in stone.
But the cause of those dinos’ demise was likely much more mundane — collapsing animal burrows, according to a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Incredibly Preserved Fossils
A steady stream of fossil discoveries in northeast China in the 1980s triggered a paleontological “Gold Rush” — a “Dino Dash,” if you will. Subsequently, many of the bones discovered in what is now called the Yixian Formation, which contained fossils from between 120 million years and 130 million years ago — were remarkably well preserved. An upper flattened fossil layer even captured some colored feather, which linked how birds and dinos were related. Another layer sometimes captured ancient creatures in 3-D poses that resembled tableaus.
