Beautiful Virgin Islands

Sunday, Sep 21, 2025

Footprints of possibly last dinosaurs to walk Britain found in Kent

Footprints of possibly last dinosaurs to walk Britain found in Kent

Scientists find fossilised footprints of multiple dinosaur species preserved by sediment in Folkestone

Footprints of what could be the last dinosaurs to have walked in Britain have been found in Kent, researchers say.

About 66m years ago, an asteroid hit the Earth and wiped out much of the Earth’s dinosaurs. But flooding rendered Britain’s dinosaurs extinct much earlier: about 110m years ago.

Back then, Britain was more or less where north Morocco or the south of Spain is now, sea levels were rapidly rising and space for dinosaurs to inhabit was disappearing. But this sandy beach in southern England near the white cliffs of Dover was idyllic.

For the meat-eaters, there was plenty of dead fish washing ashore, and for the herbivores, an abundance of fresh vegetation overhanging the beach, said the study’s author, Dave Martill, a professor of palaeobiology at the University of Portsmouth.

Fossilised footprints in Folkestone and Dover.


“There were no deckchairs, no ice-cream shops – what there was, was lots of dinosaurs. It was actually a busy place,” he said. “They were treading in the sand and mixing it up – almost ploughing it like a field … actually we could even see tracks, where they were going.”

The researchers discovered the fossilised footprints of multiple dinosaur species – preserved by sediment, filling the impression left behind when a dinosaur’s foot pushes into the ground – in an area prone to storms in Folkestone, Kent.

The footprints suggest many moderate-sized dinosaurs roamed the beach, including ankylosauruses, rugged-looking herbivorous armoured dinosaurs; theropods, three-toed flesh-eaters; and ornithopods, plant-eating “bird-hipped” dinosaurs, according to the study published in the journal Proceedings of the Geologists’ Association.

“I think that we just caught a little bit of dinosaur life,” said Martill. “This layer of rock is the last opportunity of finding evidence of dinosaurs walking in Britain. And what I can’t understand is why nobody found that before – because these rocks have been exposed for more than a hundred years.”

The study’s lead author, Philip Hadland, of the Hastings Museum and Art Gallery, said he had initially discovered unusual impressions in the rock formation in 2011 and thought they might have been footprints.

FM 2017.8.1 Tridactyl dinosaur footprint now on display at Folkestone Museum.


“This was at odds with what most geologists say about the rocks here, but I went looking for more footprints and as the tides revealed more by erosion, I found even better ones. More work was needed to convince the scientific community of their validity, so I teamed up with experts to verify what I’d found.”

Steve Brusatte, a professor of palaeontology and evolution at the University of Edinburgh who was not involved in the study, said although much has changed in the millions of years since dinosaurs once thrived on the beaches of Kent, today this part of Kent is a beach again and we can walk alongside these dinosaurs.

“They are the youngest tracks yet found, but they would not have been made by the last dinosaurs to ever live in Britain. Perhaps someday somebody will find a younger record – dinosaur tracks from even deeper into the Cretaceous.”

Newsletter

Related Articles

Beautiful Virgin Islands
0:00
0:00
Close
EU Set to Bar Big Tech from New Financial Data Access Scheme
China Bans Livestreaming and AI in Religion Amid Crackdown on Shaolin Temple Scandal
Documents Reveal Mandelson Failed to Declare Epstein-Funded Flights as MP in 2003
Dubai Property Boom Shows Strain as Flippers Get Buyer’s Remorse
Harris Memoir Sparks Backlash from Democrats for Blunt Critiques in ‘107 Days’
Germany Weighs Excluding France from Key European Fighter Jet Programme
Cyberattack Disrupts Check-in and Boarding Systems at Major European Airports
Japan’s ‘Death-Tainted’ Homes Gain Appeal as Prices Soar in Tokyo
Massive Attack Withdraws from Spotify Over Daniel Ek’s €600M Defence-AI Investment
Björn Borg Breaks Silence: Memoir Reveals Addiction, Shame and Cancer Battle
When Extremism Hijacks Idealism: How the Baader-Meinhof Gang Emerged and Fell
Top AI Researchers Are Heading Back to China as U.S. Struggles to Keep Pace
JWST Data Brings TRAPPIST-1e Closer to Earth-Like Habitability
Trump Orders Third Lethal Strike on Drug-Trafficking Vessel as U.S. Expands Maritime Counter-Narcotics Operations
Trump Orders $100,000 Fee on H-1B Visas and Launches ‘Gold Card’ Immigration Pathway
Why Google Search Is Fading and AI Is Taking Its Place
UAE-US Stargate Project Poised to Make Abu Dhabi a Global AI Powerhouse
Federal Judge Dismisses Trump’s Fifteen-Billion-Dollar Suit Against New York Times, Orders Refile
France’s Looming Budget Crisis and Political Fracture Raise Fears of Becoming Europe’s “Sick Man”
Three Russian MiG-31 Jets Breach Estonian Airspace in ‘Unprecedentedly Brazen’ NATO Incident
DeepSeek Claims R1 Model Trained for only $294,000, Sparking Global Debate Over China’s AI Capabilities
SoftBank Vision Fund to Cut Nearly Twenty Percent of Staff in Bold AI Strategy Shift
Intel’s Next-Gen Manufacturing Gets a Lifeline from Nvidia’s Strategic $5B Deal
Erika Kirk Elected CEO of Turning Point USA After Husband Charlie Kirk’s Assassination
Massive Strikes in France Pressure Macron and New PM on Austerity Proposals
Trump Seeks Supreme Court Permission to Remove Fed Governor Lisa Cook
Hillary Clinton’s Reckless Rhetoric Fuels Division After Charlie Kirk’s Assassination
NASDAQ Rises to Record as Intel Soars More Than 20%, Nvidia Gains 3%
Nvidia’s $5 Billion Bet on Intel Reshapes AI Hardware Landscape
Trump and Starmer Clash Over UK Recognition of Palestinian State Amid State Visit
Trump’s Quip on Biden and Google Lawsuit Revives Debate Over Antitrust Legacy
Macron and his wife to provide 'scientific photographic evidence' that she is a real woman
US Tech Giants Pledge Billions to UK AI Infrastructure Following Starmer's Call
Saudi Arabia cracks down on music ‘lounges’ after conservative backlash
DeepMind and OpenAI Achieve Gold at ‘Coding Olympics’ in AI Milestone
SEC Allows Public Companies to Block Investors from Class-Action Lawsuits
Saudi Arabia Signs ‘Strategic Mutual Defence’ Pact with Pakistan, Marking First Arab State to Gain Indirect Access to Nuclear Strike Capabilities in the Region
Federal Reserve Cuts Rates by Quarter Point and Signals More to Come
Effective and Impressive Generation Z Protest: Images from the Riots in Nepal
European manufacturers against ban on polluting cars: "The industry may collapse"
Sam Altman sells the 'Wedding Estate' in Hawaii for 49 million dollars
Trump: Cancel quarterly company reports and settle for reporting once every six months
Turkish car manufacturer Togg Enters German Market with 5-Star Electric Sedan and SUV to Challenge European EV Brands
US Launches New Pilot Program to Accelerate eVTOL Air Taxi Deployment
Christian Brueckner Released from German Prison after Serving Unrelated Sentence
World’s Longest Direct Flight China Eastern to Launch 29-Hour Shanghai–Buenos Aires Direct Flight via Auckland in December
New OpenAI Study Finds Majority of ChatGPT Use Is Personal, Not Professional
Hong Kong Industry Group Calls for HK$20 Billion Support Fund to Ease Property Market Stress
Joe Biden’s Post-Presidency Speaking Fees Face Weak Demand amid Corporate Reluctance
Charlie Kirk's murder will break the left's hateful cancel tactics
×