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Sarcosuchus - THE WORLD'S LARGEST CROCODILE

The ancient crocodile Sarcosuchus would have stretched more than forty feet in length,
as shown by team members laying on the ground behind a pair of lower jaws.

"You gotta come see this!" shouted David Blackburn, our youngest team member and an undergraduate at the University of Chicago. "This is unbelievable!"

Chris and Dave with Dave's spectacular find

As we approached Dave we saw rows of conical teeth in a skull the size of a Tyrannosaurus protruding from the sand. During our work at Camp 1 of the 2000 Niger Expedition, the team encountered lots of evidence of a huge crocodile - six-inch-long teeth, scutes (bony back plates) large enough to serve dinner on - but when Dave called us over we were unprepared for the sheer size of what he had uncovered.
Just as some dinosaurs were smaller than we might imagine, other animals grew to sizes that would cause many dinosaurs to think twice. One of those overgrown animals - a 40-foot-long crocodile - haunted Africa's ancient rivers and could have snapped up dinosaurs - along with anything else in reach.

Gabe with Sarcosuchus Pre-Max

French paleontologists who first discovered its cone-shaped teeth in the 1970s named the huge crocodile Sarcosuchus, - ("sarco" meaning "flesh" and "suchus" meaning "crocodile") based on a partial skull. The skull alone of this beastly reptile is the length of a full grown human. Over the last few weeks we have found many additional bones, including most of the spine, pelvic girdle and some limb bones.

Until the 2000 Expedition to Niger, nothing was known about the rest of its skeleton, such as the length of its limbs, the pattern of its body armor, and how big it could get when fully grown. Neither the skull nor any of the other bones have been described or studied. Where this animal fits in the big picture of crocodile evolution, and its relationship to living crocodiles, remains a mystery.

Paul and Jeff contemplate remains of Nigersaurus not far from an
important Sarcosuchus site. - photo by Didier Dutheil

Over the last few weeks we have found many additional bones, including most of the spine, pelvic girdle and some limb bones. Complete armor plates from the back measure one-foot in width. Skulls of various sizes will allow us to establish a growth series. With a body length of over 40 feet, Sarcosuchus, may have been the largest crocodile that ever lived.