IT'S a task that would tax even the most seasoned jigsaw puzzler, but a team of experts at Manchester Museum are now racing against the clock to assemble a full-size skeleton of a T-Rex.
In less than a week the dinosaur model will go on show to the public. But this sneak preview, granted exclusively to the Manchester Evening News, reveals that experts are already well on the way.
"This is the ultimate jigsaw puzzle," said Dr Phil Manning, curator of palaeontology at the Manchester Museum, which is a part of the new University of Manchester. "It's heavy and it's complicated, but it's excellent fun."
Dr Manning has brought the '65,000 skeleton from South Dakota. It has been cast from a fossilised skeleton and is named Stan after the man who discovered it.
Predators
Since July, Dr Manning and his team have been designing the display before starting work on assembling the giant 65 million-year-old dinosaur, which has 198 bones, earlier this week.
The skeleton shows one of the world's greatest-ever predators in action for the first time.
"The way we have had this put together is unique," said Dr Manning. "This is a 40ft animal in a flat sprint. This is a dynamic predator."
Dr Manning hopes Stan will help to inspire a new generation of young visitors to the museum.
"They are the ultimate creatures of nightmares," he said. "But they are safe because they are extinct - they are a safe monster.
"For children, monsters under the bed are far more scary than dinosaurs."
The T-Rex will be on public display at the Manchester Museum, on Oxford Road, from Thursday.
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We showed Stans skull in our Dinosaurs of Texas exhibit at the Grace Museum.It was a real hit as you can imagine. I am curious to know if the quadrate of tyrannosaurs are diagnostic. We dig in the Big Bend of Texas and have a bone that matches an internal bone that is medial from the quadrate. the bone appears to be broken but as I say it matches the morphology.Ours is much smaller though. Any help would be welcomed. Sincerely Larry Millar
I was very excited when I found out there was going to be a skeleton of a T-rex at Manchester Museum. I had recently visited the Natural History Museum in London and was disappionted it was not there. Although there were other interesting dinosaur skeletons.
Its a shame it's only a cast of the original, but its good enough and will prove inspirational and educational to future generations.
The museum should introduce things like this more often, to keep the public more informed and educated on important and interesting topics.