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Study: Four Dinosaur Species Found in Chilean Valley for First Time

An image released by the Chilean Antarctic Institute shows scientists working at a fossil site in February 2020 at Cerro Guido in southern Chile's Las Chinas valley. Handout / INACH/AFP
An image released by the Chilean Antarctic Institute shows scientists working at a fossil site in February 2020 at Cerro Guido in southern Chile's Las Chinas valley. Handout / INACH/AFP
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Study: Four Dinosaur Species Found in Chilean Valley for First Time

An image released by the Chilean Antarctic Institute shows scientists working at a fossil site in February 2020 at Cerro Guido in southern Chile's Las Chinas valley. Handout / INACH/AFP
An image released by the Chilean Antarctic Institute shows scientists working at a fossil site in February 2020 at Cerro Guido in southern Chile's Las Chinas valley. Handout / INACH/AFP

Scientists have found the remains of four species of dinosaurs, including a megaraptor, in an inhospitable valley in Chilean Patagonia that has emerged over the past decade as an important fossil deposit, researchers said Wednesday.

The fossils were found in Cerro Guido, in southern Chile's Las Chinas valley near the border with Argentina, and taken to a laboratory in 2021. The researchers said they belong to dinosaurs that have not previously been identified in the area, AFP said.

"It's always super exciting in scientific terms to find something that has not previously been discovered or described in the Las Chinas valley, where we have become used to finding new fossil remains," Marcelo Leppe, director of the Chilean Antarctic Institute (Inach) which was part of the research team, told AFP.

Inach collaborated with the University of Chile and the University of Texas on the expedition.

They identified the remains -- including teeth and postcranial bone pieces -- of four species of dinosaur including the megaraptor, which belongs to the theropod family.

These carnivorous dinosaurs had raptor claws, small teeth for tearing, and large upper limbs which, according to the research, put them at the top of the food chain in the region, which they inhabited between 66 and 75 million years ago, at the end of the Cretaceous period.

"One of the characteristics that allowed us to identify with great confidence that they belong to megaratorids are, first of all, that the teeth are very curved towards the back," said Jared Amudeo, a researcher with the University of Chile, in a statement.

They also identified two specimens of Unenlagiinae, closely related to velociraptors and which have a "novel evolutionary character, which would indicate that this is a new species of unenlagine or perhaps a representative of a different clade (group)," said Amudeo.

They also found remains of two bird species: an Enantiornithe, the most diverse and abundant group of birds of the Mesozoic; and Ornithurinae, a group directly related to present-day birds.

The scientists' work was compiled in a study published last December in the prestigious Journal of South American Earth Sciences.

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Tourist Coins Pose Giant Problem at N. Ireland's Famous Causeway Site

Tourists are pictured at the Giant's Causeway, a Unesco World Heritage Site, near Bushmills in Northern Ireland, on July 8, 2025. (Photo by PAUL FAITH / AFP)
Tourists are pictured at the Giant's Causeway, a Unesco World Heritage Site, near Bushmills in Northern Ireland, on July 8, 2025. (Photo by PAUL FAITH / AFP)
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Tourist Coins Pose Giant Problem at N. Ireland's Famous Causeway Site

Tourists are pictured at the Giant's Causeway, a Unesco World Heritage Site, near Bushmills in Northern Ireland, on July 8, 2025. (Photo by PAUL FAITH / AFP)
Tourists are pictured at the Giant's Causeway, a Unesco World Heritage Site, near Bushmills in Northern Ireland, on July 8, 2025. (Photo by PAUL FAITH / AFP)

Northern Ireland's Giant Causeway draws close to one million visitors a year but their habit of wedging tiny coins in cracks between the rocks -- to bring love or luck -- is damaging the world-famous wonder.

Now authorities are urging tourists to keep their coins in their pockets to preserve the spectacular landscape.

Some 40,000 columns mark the causeway, Northern Ireland's first UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Geologists say the natural phenomenon was created by an outpouring of basalt lava 60 million years ago.

Legend has it that the causeway was formed by Irish giant Finn McCool.

In recent decades, visitors have pushed thousands of coins into fissures in the rocks.

The gesture is "a token of love or luck", according to Cliff Henry, the causeway's nature engagement officer.

But the coins rapidly corrode and expand, causing the basalt to flake and leaving "unsightly" rust-colored streaks, Henry told AFP.

He pointed to streaks on a rock and gingerly prized out a US cent with a set of keys.

"We get a lot of euros and dollar cents. But coins from literally all over the world -- any currency you can think of, pretty much -- we have had it here," he said.

A report by the British Geological Survey in 2021 revealed that the coins were "doing some serious damage" and something had to be done about it, he noted.

Signs are now in place around the site appealing to tourists to "leave no trace".
"Once some visitors see other people have done it, they feel that they need to add to it," causeway tour guide Joan Kennedy told AFP.

She and her colleagues now gently but firmly tell tourists to desist.

At the exit from the causeway, a US couple said they were "distressed" to hear of the damage the metal caused.

"Our guide mentioned as we came up that people had been putting coins into the stones. It's really terrible to hear that," said Robert Lewis, a 75-year-old from Florida.

"It's kind of like damaging any kind of nature when you are doing something like that, putting something foreign into nature. It's not good," said his wife, Geri, 70.

As part of a £30,000 ($40,000) conservation project, stone masons recently removed as many coins as they could -- without causing further damage -- from 10 test sites around the causeway.

Henry said the trial was successful and is to be expanded across the causeway.

"If we can get all those coins removed to start with that will help the situation and hopefully no more coins will be put in," he said.

"If visitors see fewer coins in the stones and hear appeals to stop the damaging practice, the problem can maybe be solved.

"We know that visitors love and cherish the Giant's Causeway, and many form deep personal connections to it, so we want this natural wonder to remain special for future generations."