The Dinosaur That Went Extinct Twice
The confusing story of the mighty Brontosaurus…
Few prehistoric creatures are as iconic as Brontosaurus, the mighty “thunder lizard”. Thanks to its evocative name and gargantuan size, Brontosaurus quickly invaded popular culture, becoming one of the most famous dinosaurs of all time.
Despite its popularity, though, scientists had been denying its existence for more than a century. Paleontologists had previously noted that Brontosaurus looked too similar to Apatosaurus, a sauropod with an equally long neck and tail. The consensus was that the two species were in fact the same dinosaur. The rules of scientific naming imply that Brontosaurus should be discarded in favor of Apatosaurus, since the latter genus was named first. Although the name Brontosaurus refused to die in popular culture, the “thunder lizard” was considered extinct in the scientific world.
Yet, in 2015 a meticulous study by a team of scientists from Portugal and the United Kingdom shed new light on the subject. Their detailed research concluded that Brontosaurus was a separate genus from Apatosaurus after all. The “thunder lizard” that during the previous decades had gone both literally and scientifically extinct was finally resurrected -at least in the paleontology nomenclature.
