Introduction
I was a member of the paleontological team that traveled to Egypt in January/February 2000 to excavate the 90 million-year-old fossils of many species, including dinosaurs, from the Western Desert. During that six-week dig we uncovered a number of amazing finds. Of note was the discovery and excavation of a sauropod dinosaur, the Paralititan stromeri. This was not only a new species of long-necked dinos, but possibly the second-largest dinosaur ever discovered! This discovery was published in the June 1, 2001 issue of Science and made headlines worldwide. The expedition was largely funded and documented by the MPH and Cosmos Studios resulting in a video documentary, “The Lost Dinosaurs of Egypt” and a book of the same title. That video focused on the project’s principals. This is a narrative of my own perception of and participation in this expedition as a paleontological field worker in Egypt’s Bahariya Oasis, dubbed the "Bahariya Dinosaur Project".
The History
Between 1911 and 1914 German paleontologist Dr. Ernst Stromer conducted a fossil-hunting expedition through Egypt's Western Desert to the Bahariya Oasis near the town of Bawiti, close to 250 miles southwest of Cairo. He and his team uncovered a number of 90 million-year-old fossilized bones from a number of late Cretaceous animal and plant species including crocodiles, fish, turtles, snakes and best of all, four new species of dinosaurs. There were three carnivorous allosaurs (T-rex-like) and one herbivorous sauropod (brontosaurus-like) discovered.
Unfortunately the start of World War I cut short the desert treks, but, over the next several decades these intriguing finds were described and published by Dr. Stromer and other scientists. There were no further expeditions and no further digging, mostly because the Egyptian authorities had severely limited access to their country in an attempt to remedy past exploitation, wholesale stripping and exportation by foreign archeologists and profiteers of their pharonic treasures from the few remaining intact ancient tombs. Although stricter enforcement by the Egyptian government’s Department of Antiquities stemmed the tide of their natural treasures to other countries and shored up this precious national resource, a vast number of these national treasures remain overseas. Due to the crackdown on their exportation a portion of this vast collection has been recovered or subsequently excavated and can be viewed in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.
Stromer never returned to continue his digs in the Western Desert. The original fossils were eventually studied, illustrated, catalogued and described for a number of publications and were then displayed and housed in Munich’s Museum of Natural History. Tragically, in 1944 at the height of World War II, the allies bombed the city making a direct hit on a nearby arms magazine. The resulting conflagration spread to the museum and all the Egyptian fossils were destroyed.
Over the intervening years the Egyptian Geological Survey had declined numerous requests by scientists for the opportunity to scout and excavate the potential mother lode of cretaceous fossils in this desert. That is, until now.
The Start
The Professors:
Dr. Dodson is first, a dinosaur paleontologist world-renowned for his work with ceratopsians and is the author and co-editor of several books and a number of papers and abstracts on various aspects of the subject. At the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia Peter Dodson is a much-loved teacher, a professor in the two divergent but academically related subjects of Biology and Geology in two schools of the university. He teaches Veterinary Gross Anatomy in Penn’s Vet School and leads a course in Vertebrate Paleontology in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, (“EES” formerly known as “Geology”).
I met Peter in 1997-98 when I first started working as a dinosaur docent/volunteer at the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia and during the Dinofest celebration. Peter offered the opportunity to those interested museum workers in Dinosaur Hall to audit his Spring Geology Department course in Vertebrate Paleontology. Through this class I not only expanded my appetite for anything dinosaur, I met Peter’s other graduate students and learned far more about the massive variables in the study of paleontology.
Dr. Giegangack is a Professor of Geology and is the Chair of the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania. As a young geologist Bob Giegangack (aka “Gieg”) cut his professional teeth with the Geological Survey in Egypt as an advisor with the Aswan Dam project with, among a number of responsibilities, the logistics of the relocation of the numerous ancient structures and statues necessitated by the flooding of the valley floor. Having, by necessity, to learn to speak Arabic, Gieg has over the years maintained his professional contacts. These co-workers of his youth have become, 35 years later, the leaders and government officials, and fellow colleagues from whom he requests assistance with a project proposed by his graduate students in 1999.
(Much more to come...)
