A chance discovery in the desert
In 2010, a farm worker named Aurelio Hernández was looking for lost sheep on the La Flecha ranch in the desert of Chubut Province when he spotted the tip of a massive bone protruding from a rock. The bone was a femur measuring 2.4 meters (7.9 feet) long—the largest ever found. The Mayo family, owners of the ranch, contacted paleontologists from the Egidio Feruglio Paleontology Museum (MEF) in Trelew.
Excavations led by José Luis Carballido and Diego Pol began in 2013. Over several years, their team unearthed a spectacular fossil discovery: more than 150 bones from at least six different individuals. The fossils were remarkably well-preserved and represented one of the most complete titanosaur discoveries ever made. The geological layer containing the bones, part of the Cerro Barcino Formation, dates to approximately 101.6 million years ago, during the Late Cretaceous period. Analysis of the site showed that the animals had died there on at least three separate occasions, their carcasses subsequently buried by the sediment of overflowing rivers.