Dino Dig - Linked | Explorer

NARRATOR: Welcome to Moab, Utah, surrounded by thousands of square miles of Mars-like Red Rock landscape and the mighty Colorado River. Surprisingly, Utah has yielded fossils from more dinosaur species than any other state. And that fact alone makes for a thrilling story, 150 million years in the making. It involves the Civil War, an incredible cargo airlift mission, and the sight of a dig that could unearth a major discovery, a missing piece in the dinosaur family tree.

Let's take a deeper look at how the fossil and a long lost sea are linked. In the early 1800s, there was this patch of desert in eastern Utah that got some attention for being an easy, natural crossing point on the Colorado River, along the old Spanish Trail, good for trade. A few key railroad lines later, it was 1859, and a US geological expedition discovered this giant, awesome fossil in the area. But before they could unearth it, the Civil War broke out. Yep, and the fossil was long forgotten for almost 150 years.

In 2014, National Geographic explorer John Foster picked up where the Civil War and a few other scientists in the '80s and '90s left off. And his excavation team began to find the remnants of a Sauropod. Huh? Well, you've probably heard of the Brontosaurus or the Brachiosaurus. They're Sauropods—long necks, long tails, four-legged, eats leaves. Turns out they have a common ancestor. And at least in North America, it might be this guy, Dystrophaeus.

But wait. Why are there dinosaurs here? Where does this leaf-eating dinosaur get his greens in the desert? Well, this arid desert was actually a long lost sea. 190 million years ago, this place was an oasis. Think spring break—sandbars, drinks with little umbrellas, but like the dinosaur version. Not a bad place for the potentially oldest Sauropod in North America to call home.

Relocating this dinosaur vertebrate for research is no joke. Each piece weighs a whopping 800 pounds and has to be covered in plaster. And the team is on the edge of a cliff. It sounds like a job for—the dinosaur fossil airlift cargo helicopter service. OK, that's actually not really a thing. But watch this. [helicopter motor] Pretty unbelievable.

What Foster and his team began unearthing in this long lost sea could be a missing link in North America's dinosaur family tree. Welcome to the family, Dystrophaeus. But that's not the whole story. For more, watch new episodes of "Explore," on National Geographic.