'They're Approaching the Tyrannosaur Paddock'

Hovering directly above the remains of a tyrannosaurid discovered in the Badlands of Valley County, helicopter pilot Rob Sperry needed to remain stationary as archaeologist Josh Chase connected a steel cable hanging from the Chinook to the steel frame on the ground containing the fossils.

Not only did Chase need to be wary of the cable and hook –weighing in excess of 100 pounds and potentially becoming a wrecking ball – but of the electricity generated by the helicopter.

"That helicopter generates so much static electricity," Chase told The Courier following Saturday's lift. "Usually, when they put [the wire] on the ground, it will ground it out."

This time around, there was a bit of a charge left over. That "little zap" certainly got Chase's attention, he said, not that adrenaline wasn't already flowing through his veins as the two rotored helicopter descended into the dusty coulee.

Still, Chase is used to it by now, having served in the U.S. Army in a long range surveillance detachment. Most recently, he was involved in helping the Bureau of Land Management fight wildland fires throughout Montana.

And while those jobs are most definitely exciting, it isn't everyday Chase gets to help lift tyrannosaurid remains out of the badlands.

"It feels pretty good," said chase, District Archaeologist for North Central Montana District of BLM. "Getting it out of that hole is reassuring. Every time you pick something up with a helicopter you want to make sure that everything is good and solid."

Once the first frame was attached to the helicopter, Sperry gently lifted the load – weighing about 10,000 pounds – up into the air and off to an awaiting trailer a few miles away.

"I wish it would have been surgical," Sperry said. "It was a pain. It was very hard. I was having a real hard time seeing that load coming in, because of the glare in the window. I was trying to lean out. You just have to hold your hover, not look at the load, and wait."

There was plenty of dust kicked up by the rotors, which also made it hard to see initially, Sperry said.

"It kind of blows out, and then you are fine. Then it is just a matter of holding it there and listening to the guy trying to talk you in. It is hard to hear him."

Once attached, the process of lifting was relatively easy, Sperry said.

"Getting them up is not that big of a deal because you are not really concerned about trying to set [the hook] down in these little troughs. Coming out is a lot easier. Just make sure you get it tight and get over the top of it and come straight up so you are not dragging it against" the ground or cliff faces.

Over at the trailer site, with access to the highway, dropping the load onto the flatbed required even more skill.

"Oh, its way harder," Sperry said.

"You are talking to people on the ground," Sperry continued. "It is 10,000 pounds and is moving and really hard to slow down."

But, after repeating the process twice more to get two other frames out of the coulee and safely dropping them atop the trailers, Sperry could pause and reflect on the moment.

"It is a cool day," Sperry said, adding it is a rare event to lift up dinosaur fossils. "Most definitely. I don't know of many people that have, right?"

Making the day even more auspicious, this was the maiden flight for the Boeing CH-47 Chinook, which was recently refurbished and placed into service with the Billings Flying Service.

"It is very recently renovated," Sperry said. "It just came out. It has about 3.5 hours on it now. It started out its life as a C-Model or a B-Model and in the late 80s or early 90s it got sent back to Boeing and transferred over to a D-Model."

The helicopter, number "88," did well for her maiden flight, Sperry said.

"She did good. There were a few little hiccups and things that still need to be fixed, but other than that it is a really clean and nice aircraft. Everything went pretty smooth. It was fun and enjoyable."

To commemorate the maiden flight of 88, the crew hopes to put a big sticker of a T-Rex somewhere on her fuselage, Sperry said.

A Momentous Occasion

It took several years for a team of volunteer paleontologists – directed by Dr. Denver Fowler, PhD., Curator of the Badlands Dinosaur Museum – to prepare the tyrannosaurid remains for airlift.

"It feels great, it feels satisfying," said Bobby Ebelhar, a long time volunteer, "It is a big relief to have it. This is a once in a lifetime experience to see a dinosaur fly out of the ground. It is going to be back and protected in a lab where we can work on it and research it. It is going to be a world class specimen ... for generations. It will be in the museum fossil lab and will be in front of the windows so people can come and see us working on it too."

Fowler said, as of Monday, the specimens gad arrived safely at the museum – located in Dickinson, North Dakota – despite one of the trailer tires blowing out just outside of Wolf Point.

Fowler's team discovered the tyrannosaurid remains near the site of duck-bill dinosaur fossils felled about 75.5 to 78 million years while the magnificent beasts moved along a prehistoric delta feeding the Western Interior Seaway. The seaway once extended from what is now known as the Arctic Ocean down through the Gulf of Mexico, splitting North America into two separate land masses -- Appalachia to the east and Laramidia to the west.

The tyrannosaurid remains airlifted on Saturday are not representative of the Tyrannosaurus Rex, a related species. Still, they were quite the predator in their time. They stood on two legs and had two short forelimbs with two clawed digits. They could grow up to 40-feet in length and weighed in at a whopping six metric tons. Their mouths were full of serrated teeth, and one of their favorite meals were duck-billed dinosaurs, of which there was an ample supply.

The paleontologists were led to this area of the badlands by BLM back in 2016. There are currently about 40-active dig sites county wide at locations well off the beaten path. The fossils are commonly located in a layer known as the Judith River Formation, Fowler has said. This layer is found beneath the Bearpaw Formation and above the Claggett Shale formation.

The Badlands in Valley County are rich in dinosaur fossils, but the area has often been ignored in the past.

"We have done a lot of surface collecting and picked up loads and loads of things off the surface," Fowler said. "A lot of these little pockets weren't really looked at very much. People didn't find them. Unless you hiked out into these areas, you didn't know there was good rock there. These days, you have Google Earth and see where these cliffs are."

Paleontologists currently are building a better picture of what was happening in Valley County when dinosaurs roamed the wilds, Fowler said.

"How is the environment different here? How does it line up with Canada and what does that tell us about the way these animals evolved and the way they lived?"

Fowler said he was curious as to why more attention had not been given to Valley County before his team showed up in 2016.

"I think the BLM office was happy when there was somebody up here doing a bit of paleo. Other parts of Montana have had lots of paleo. Up here, it hasn't been as prominent. There are some good places up here, but for one reason or another, people haven't worked any of it."

Other rich dig sites may soon be found, Fowler hopes.

"We are working on the Hi-Line quite a bit," he said. "We know there are good spots all the way along. This delta is building out from west to east, so you go from Havre to here and see different parts of the delta, different parts of the environment. Wherever you get bits of good exposure, you can find something. It is not always dinosaurs. You can find one of these great reptiles that lived in the sea at the time. We found one last year."

Next Phase Begins

With the safe arrival of the fossils at the museum, paleontologists can now begin the painstaking work of unearthing the fossils from the surrounding dirt and rock, Fowler said.

"The next step is to flip it over and wheel it into the lab. Then, we are hiring a preparator at the moment who will be working on this long term. I reckon about two years to clean it. You can't work on it all the time, because it is hard going. We will see. Two years to get it cleaned and mounted on display. We will probably only clean it from one side, but I haven't ruled out doing both sides. We will see how it looks."

Fowler stated his gratitude for the scores of people involved in unearthing the fossils and helping get them to the museum. He also thanked the donors who paid for the helicopter service including BLM, TC Energy and Conoco.

For more information about Dickinson Museum Center, visit http://dickinsonmuseumcenter.com/badlands_home/