Frankfurt/Main (dpa/lhe) - With menacingly bared teeth, the Tyrannosaurus rex model in front of Frankfurt's Senckenberg Museum is a popular photo motif and a reference to the collection in the museum's well-known dinosaur hall. But while the sculpture is extremely young compared to the 66-68 million year old remains, it is visually showing its age. The paint has peeled off on the fiberglass composite model. A new coat of paint should help the dinosaur model to refresh its appearance in the coming days, as a museum spokeswoman reported on Thursday. From Monday the artist Marcel Walldorf will restore the dinosaur and give it a new color.
The Tyrannosaurus rex lived 66 to 68 million years ago during the Cretaceous Period and was distributed in today's US states of Montana, Wyoming and South Dakota, among other places. Little is known about the original coloring. "Most of the colorations these days are provided with light stripe patterns, which we would like to pick up on," said project leader Philipe Havlik. "We will use more brown tones and also emphasize the face a little more." No other dinosaur is as iconic as the T. rex. He is representative of all large dinosaurs and was also one of the last of their group, which died out 66 million years ago, probably due to a meteorite impact.
