London – A killer newt the size of a small car terrorised lakes and rivers during the rise of the dinosaurs, scientists have discovered.
The ferocious amphibian – a distant relative of salamanders living today – were one of the Earth’s top predators more than 200million years ago.
Fossil remains of the species, Metoposaurus algarvensi s, were found at the site of an ancient lake in southern Portugual which may have been home to several hundred of the creatures, said scientists.
Dr Steve Brusatte, from the University of Edinburgh’s School of GeoSciences, who led a study of Metoposaurus, said it looked like ‘something out of a bad monster movie’.
He added: ‘It had hundreds of sharp teeth in its big flat head, which kind of looks like a toilet seat when the jaws snap shut.
Members of the Portuguese Metoposaurus colony are thought to have died when the lake they inhabited dried up.
Daily Mail