IN PICS | 67-million-year-old T-Rex skeleton on display ahead of auction
Tyrannosaurus-Rex 'Trinity'
67-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus-Rex skeleton named 'Trinity' stands tall at 3.9 metres and is currently valued between $6.5-$8.7 million (eight million Swiss francs).
Giving the final touches
Project manager Nils Knoetschke gives final touches to Trinity ahead of the auction. This will be the first time that a T-Rex will go under the hammer in Europe and only the third time worldwide that an entire 'skeleton' of exceptional quality was on offer.
Shipped from Arizona to Zurich
Yolanda Schicker-Siber (L), curator of the Aathal Dinosaur Museum takes part in the installation of 'Trinity'. The T-Rex skeleton was shipped from Arizona in the US to Zurich, Switzerland in nine large created.
Trinity's structure
Trinity has been composed using the bone material of three T-Rex specimens, excavated between 2008-2013 in the US states of Montana and Wyoming. The sale becomes all the more important as only 32 skeletons of adult T-Rex's have been discovered worldwide.
Trinity being sold by a private individual
The auctioneers stated that Trinity was provided by a private individual. "The Zurich auction is therefore an exceptional opportunity to acquire such a fossil of the highest quality," said the auction house.
T-Rex bidding wars
Trinity is expected to shatter all previous bidding records. Notably, in 2020, a T-Rex skeleton nicknamed 'Stan' was sold for a whopping $31.8 million in New York. It then shredded the previous record set by a specimen called Sue that was sold for $8.4 million in October 1997 by Sotheby's to the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago.
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