Soon, the public will be able to view a rare juvenile Tyrannosaurus rex fossil at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, thanks to three young boys in North Dakota.
The fossil will be a part of a new temporary experience called, “Discovering Teen Rex,” which will open on June 21 at 1:30 p.m. Visitors can watch the fossil be prepped in real time, according to the museum. A team of scientists will be cleaning, preserving and studying the rare bones.
The museum shared that a trio of young fossil hunters came across the bones during a family hike in North Dakota. Two young brothers, Jessin and Liam Fisher, their dad, Sam Fisher, and their cousin, Kaiden Madsen are credited with the rare discovery in the Badlands in 2022.
The science museum said only a handful of juvenile T. rex skeletons have ever been found.
According to the museum, the Fisher family contacted the Denver Museum of Nature and Science’s Curator of Paleontology Tyler Lyson, who happened to go to the same high school as the boys’ father.
In the summer of 2023, the young explorers returned to the site where they found the fossil, and with the help of Lyson and a team of paleontologists, they successfully excavated the fossil.
