BBC ULTAN BATOR, MONGOLIA - A dinosaur mystery that has baffled palaeontologists for 50 years has finally been solved. In the 1960s, researchers unearthed two gigantic dinosaur arms. For decades, scientists have speculated about what kind of beast they belonged to.
Now, the rest of the dinosaur’s body has been unearthed, and researchers say that the creature is even more bizarre than they had thought. They say it was huge, with a beak, a humped back and giant, hoofed feet. The study is published in the journal Nature. Lead researcher Yuong-Nam Lee, from South Korea’s Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources (Kigam), said: ‘It turned out to be one of the weirdest dinosaurs, it’s weird beyond our imagination.’ For half a century, all that was known about this dinosaur was that it had enormous forearms, measuring 2.4m-long (8ft) and tipped with three giant claws. Its name Deinocheirus mirificus means unusual, horrible hands. In various reconstructions, it has been imagined as anything from a T. rex-type predator grasping at prey with its claws, to a giant, sloth-like climber, using its arms to dangle from trees. But the discovery of two nearly complete skeletons in Mongolia has finally laid this speculation to rest.