A well-preserved fossilized skeleton of a rare, bird-like dinosaur was discovered by construction crews after they used dynamite to blast away surrounding rock formations.
The find, named tongtianlong limosus, appears from its splayed limbs and neck curvature that it died getting its feet trapped in mud, leaving it nearly intact since the Cretaceous Period, according to Nature Scientific Reports.
The name translates from Chinese as "muddy dragon on the road to heaven," according to CNN.
The skeleton, believed to be 72 million years old, is considered to have at one time been nearly complete. The dome-like skull is only missing a few pieces. A drill hole where TNT was placed is apparent in the pelvic bone.
It is a type of oviraptorosaur, an unusual feathered dinosaur that has been more recently discovered in Asia and North America in the last decade.
"Because of these discoveries, this part of southern China has rapidly become one of the best areas in the world for oviraptorosaur fossils," the journal reports. "And therefore a keystone area for understanding the evolution of this highly aberrant group of bird-like feathered dinosaurs."
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