Hundreds of dinosaur footprints found in quarry by researchers in extremely 'rare' discovery

A 'dinosaur highway' dating back millions of years has been discovered in the UK.

Researchers from the University of Birmingham and the University of Oxford, UK, have made an extremely rare discovery and unearthed almost 200 dinosaur tracks.

The tracks were located in an Oxfordshire quarry, where they'd been buried under mud.

It's believed the footprints date back around 166 million years.

A 'dinosaur highway' has been discovered in Oxfordshire (Emma Nicholls/University of Birmingham/PA Wire)

Making the revelation even more interesting and rare is that rather than there just being the odd footprint, researchers found continuous tracks which they've dubbed as a 'dinosaur highway'.

In total, five trackways were uncovered.

The longest continuous track of footprints measured more than 150 meters in length, with four made by long-necked herbivorous dinosaurs called sauropods and most likely to be Cetiosaurus, an up to 18-meter-long cousin of the Diplodocus.

Another of the so-called highways is thought to have been created by the nine-meter-long carnivorous Megalosaurus.

Almost 200 tracks were found by the 100-strong team of researchers (Emma Nicholls/University of Birmingham/PA Wire)

Experts say the new discoveries will provide valuable insights into how the dinosaurs walked, the speeds they reached, how big they were, and if and how they interacted with each other.

Dr Duncan Murdock, an earth scientist at the Oxford University Museum of Natural History (OUMNH), said: "The preservation is so detailed that we can see how the mud was deformed as the dinosaurs’ feet squelched in and out.

“Along with other fossils like burrows, shells and plants we can bring to life the muddy lagoon environment the dinosaurs walked through."

Professor Richard Butler, professor of palaeobiology at the University of Birmingham, added: "There is much more that we can learn from this site, which is an important part of our national Earth heritage.

"Our 3D models will allow researchers to continue to study and make accessible this fascinating piece of our past for generations to come."

How the Megalosaurus and Cetiosaurus may have created the footprints found (Mark Witton/University of Birmingham/PA Wire)

The new footprints led to other trackways that were discovered in the area in 1997.

Limestone quarrying revealed more than 40 sets of footprints at the time.

In the more recent case, researchers were called to the site because 'unusual bumps' were spotted by quarry worker Gary Johnson as he was stripping clay back with a digger to expose the floor.

"I was basically clearing the clay, and I hit a hump, and I thought it's just an abnormality in the ground," Johnson recalled to the BBC.

"I thought I'm the first person to see them," he went on. "It was so surreal - a bit of a tingling moment, really."

• Forgotten envelope leads to discovery of rare ‘cyborg’ Earth mineral found in only 8 countries
• Researchers believe chilling new Shroud of Turin discovery proves one major Jesus theory
• Archaeologists make groundbreaking 'real-life Atlantis' discovery as submerged city found after 525 years
• Scientists think they've solved 180-million-year-old mystery of unusual heat beneath US mountains