Environmentalists and scientists were rattled this week following a report that President Donald Trump plans to scale back two of southern Utah’s national monuments. Not only would the project endanger sacred Native American sites and breathtaking Western vistas open to the public — but also some of the most important dinosaur fossils in the world. Scientists worry that removing the land from federal protection and opening it up to coal mining will jeopardize critical fossils in the 1.9 million-acre Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. Zinke’s recommendation would open up the Kaiparowits Plateau in the Grand Staircase, which includes an incredibly rich collection of dinosaur fossils dating to the Cretaceous. The remarkable find — with many bones frozen in life-like movements — was discovered two years ago.

Source: Huffington Post October 29, 2017 03:11 UTC