A new species of dinosaur, standing 1.8m tall, weighing up to 4.5 tonnes and wielding the longest horns yet found, has been unearthed.
The 72-million-year-old herbivore, now named Coahuilaceratops magnacuerna, has two large horns above its eyes measuring up to 1.22m long, the largest of any other species.
The discovery is expected to provide fresh insight into the history of western North America.
Scientists uncovered fossils belonging to an adult and a juvenile of the rhino-sized tubby creature at the Cerro del Pueblo Formation, in Coahuila, Mexico.
It measured about 6.7m long as an adult, standing 1.8m tall at the shoulder and hips.
“We know very little about the dinosaurs of Mexico, and this find increases immeasurably our knowledge of the dinosaurs living in Mexico during the Late Cretaceous,” the study’s lead author, Mark Loewen, a paleontologist with the Utah Museum of Natural History, said over the weekend. His team is to release a book this week detailing the find, which took place during expeditions in 2002 and 2003 in the Coahuila desert.
The study was funded by the National Geographic Society and the University of Utah.
According to the scientists, the dinosaurs probably died en masse in the area because of storms similar to hurricanes.
During most of the Late Cretaceous period, 97 to 65 million years ago, high global sea levels led to flooding of the central, low-lying portion of North America.
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