Dinosaur footprints uncovered in Egypt's Eastern Desert

CAIRO — An Egyptian research team announced in early February the discovery of the footprints of carnivorous and herbivorous dinosaurs in the southern Eastern Desert, which date back more than 70 million years.

President of the New Valley University Abdel Aziz Tantawi said in a press statement Feb. 2, “The scientific discovery, the first of its kind in Egypt, was the result of joint efforts between the Vertebrate Paleontology Lab at Cairo University and the Vertebrate Paleontology Center at New Valley University. [The discovery] is clear evidence of the presence of giant carnivorous and herbivorous dinosaurs in the Eastern Desert of Egypt more than 70 million years ago.”

According to a report published Feb. 8 by Sky News Arabia, there had been an assumption that dinosaurs roamed the Eastern Desert in Egypt more than 70 million years ago. “But this hypothesis was not supported by any physical discovery, until three Egyptian scientists announced the first physical evidence of dinosaur footprints in the Eastern Desert recently,” the report stated.

Mohammed Qarni, director of the Vertebrate Paleontology Lab at Cairo University and one of the members of the research team behind the discovery, told Al-Monitor, “The discovery of 16 footprints of dinosaurs on layers of the Nubian sandstone showed the presence of two-legged carnivorous dinosaurs and four-legged herbivorous dinosaurs.”