These One-of-a-Kind Dinosaurs Now Have a Home in Cincinnati

The Dinosaur Hall is not just a new feature in the restored Cincinnati Art Museum and Union Terminal. 

It has dinosaur specimens you won't find on display anywhere else. 

We got a sneak peek of the exhibit hall.

Here's what we learned:

The gallery is new. The dinosaurs specimens are really old. And rare. It features six huge displays ranging from the Jurassic Period (153 to 145 million years ago) to the Cretaceous Period (145 to 65 million years ago), including five on display to the public for the first time.

The 7,000-square-foot gallery is located in the Museum of Natural History & Science. (You'll notice a sign for the gallery in the rotunda.)

A closer look at the dinosaurs. 

The museum center's 35-foot, four-ton Torvosaurus is the only one of its kind in the world. Isolated bones have been found, but this is the only specimen discovered largely intact.

Here's a fun fact: This apex predator, with nine-inch-long teeth and three claws, would have eaten herbivores like the Galeamopus and Diplodocus, both of which are also on display in the new gallery.

Speaking of the 60-foot-long Galeamopus, the museum center has the most complete specimen of this long-necked giant in the world. The museum's paleontologists unearthed it in Montana from 2000-2004.

You'll also see the Tyrannosaurus rex’s much older cousin Daspletosaurus. The one in the gallery here is one of less than a dozen specimens in the world. 

What else is new? You can watch paleontologists at work in the new lab, use video microscopes and check out an interactive globe that shows the continents moving over 600 million years. 

When will it open to the public? It will open Saturday as part of the grand reopening celebration at Union Terminal.

Learn more: Visit cincymuseum.org/sciencemuseum/dinosaurs.

Source: www.cincinnati.com