Fossils from 'jumbo jet' of reptiles identified

Scientists believe they have identified fossils from a new species of flying reptile that lived between 70 million and 80 million years ago.

With a wingspan the size of a small aircraft, it was the largest flying creature ever, the jumbo jet of its era.

"Let's not call them dinosaurs," said University of Portsmouth researcher Dr David Martill while addressing a session of the BA Festival of Science at Trinity College Dublin yesterday.

Known generally as pterosaurs and familiar to many as the pterodactyl, these giants soared through prehistoric skies until, like dinosaurs, they became extinct about 65 million years ago.

"They were very big animals indeed," Dr Martill said, and they sported wingspans of eight to 10m. Now an even larger pterosaur has been discovered, one with a possible wingspan of 18m.

"We now have a lot of evidence that this thing was much bigger," he said.

Bone fragments have come in from Mexico, the Isle of Wight, Israel and Uzbekistan, which have allowed palaeontologists to begin to piece together what these creatures might have looked like.

"Even if they are fragments, they are very big fragments for what they are," he said.

A single finger bone was no less than 12cm across - a "really spectacular diameter".