
Dinosaur Footprints on a Cave Ceiling - tapper
https://scienceblog.com/516341/dinosaur-footprints-on-a-cave-ceiling/
======
hinkley
I used to work with a guy who during his misspent youth was part of a group
trying to set a record for the tallest cave systems, so they were looking high
in the mountains and for certain geological formations.

The insight he shared with me was that caves don’t form in the softest or most
permeable layers of rock. Instead they tend to form above the hardest layers -
water wants to seek the lowest level and the only thing to stop it is a layer
that’s hard, or impermeable. Whatever is above that is where the water does
most of its work, even if there are softer layers further up.

So if I have it right, these dinosaur footprints were made upon a softer layer
above very hard material that makes up the base of the cave, and the layer
above those two was hard enough that it has so far resisted erosion, leaving
effectively a stone cast of a dinosaur foot, rather than a footprint that has
somehow been flipped 180 degrees.

~~~
rumanator
> (...) leaving effectively a stone cast of a dinosaur foot, rather than a
> footprint that has somehow been flipped 180 degrees.

Yes, I also share that opinion. In fact, just by looking at the photo from
Nature it seems like the cave's floor is comprised of upper strata that have
cracked, broked off and fell down. If just so happened that the layer
currently exposed has the imprint of some dinosaur footprints.

Perhaps other visitors didn't noticed it because the previous layer broke off
recently?

~~~
hinkley
Do archaeologists use the term 'footprint' differently than we use it
colloquially, or is the title just wrong?

To me a footprint isn't shaped like my foot. It's something that my foot fits
into.

------
aristophenes
Here's a link to an article from April 2nd that actually shows a picture of
the cave ceiling:
[https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00972-y](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00972-y)

~~~
syllable_studio
Thanks, here's a somewhat higher resolution image.
[https://media.nature.com/w3000/magazine-
assets/d41586-020-00...](https://media.nature.com/w3000/magazine-
assets/d41586-020-00972-y/d41586-020-00972-y_17851312.jpg)

------
pvaldes
Party hard

Apart of that, the presence of the footprints in the upper strata is not
particularly strange. Dinosaur footprints are not so easy to spot for a non
specialist. Often just a round concavity in the floor that could be done by
anything.

------
rurp
This is a really neat discovery. For those in the western US there is a pretty
accessible sauropod trackway in Grand Staircase National Monument at a place
called Twenty Mile Wash that is well worth checking out.

------
mrlonglong
At first, my mind was blown by the facts dinos could walk on the ceiling, then
I read the explanation.

A little disappointed here.

------
Descartes1
Antigravosaurus was here.

------
hardlianotion
Sounds like top trolling by the dinos in question.

~~~
thih9
The article describes that dinosaurs made footprints on the ground, it took
ages and a number of geological processes for the footprints to appear on a
cave ceiling.

~~~
hardlianotion
Thanks. I have stopped thinking they were lying on their backs and smiling to
themselves.

------
valuearb
Creationists are going to have a field day with this.

