David Attenborough has talked about discovering “the most terrifying animal in the seas” for his new documentary, Attenborough and the Giant Sea Monster.
The documentary follows the giant sea monster in question, a pliosaur, which was discovered on Dorset’s famous Jurassic Coast. Attenborough, together with two of the UK’s top fossil hunters, starts the show on a mission to excavate its giant skull from its resting place, 12 metres up a cliff face.
“That is one of the biggest skulls you've ever seen,” he said. “I mean, it's huge and so although I was aware of the tip that was first discovered, I hadn't fully appreciated how big the whole head would be and it's enormous.”
In addition to excavating the skull, much of the documentary will focus on finding out what it can tell us about the creatures that lived on our planet 150 million years ago.
In addition to its sheer size, the skull also incorporates “little details” like the pores and sensory pits. “There is also the parietal eye – in some animals, including this one, it seems there is a primitive eye in the top of the head," Attenborough says. "That's the sort of detail which we weren't sure about but which this skull has already given us more information about.”
The documentary also draws on the expertise of an international team of scientists, who used CGI and advanced scanning to determine how the pliosaur moved and behaved – apparently, a bit like a penguin.
“I asked this schoolboy question, I said, ‘Now, supposing Tyrannosaurus rex met this extraordinary pliosaur, who would win?” Attenborough recounted asking one of the American scientists on the show.
“He said, ‘Well, I think it probably was this pliosaur that won.’” According to the experts who worked on the series, the skull discovered “almost certainly” belonged to an entirely new species of pliosaur: one as-yet undiscovered.
“So it's a new species, and it would have been able to deal with Tyrannosaurus rex straight up in a fight. So what more do you want?”
Attenborough also talked about his first experiences of fossil hunting. “It's easy to do when you're eight-year-old, you know, it's that little romance which I never lost,” he said, adding he used to go exploring quarries in Leicestershire during the weekend.
“There's this wonderful creature that nobody has seen before you in 150 million years. If you’re young or old, it’s a joy! I’ve never got over it really. It’s very romantic. I mean, people talk about science, the cold, calculating eye of science, which of course you have to have, but it doesn't prevent you from having romance as well.”
