# Dreadnoughtus schrani

> A giant titanosaur from the Late Cretaceous of southern Patagonia and the most complete giant sauropod known, with about 70% of its skeleton below the head. The type individual was still growing when it died.

- Classification: Dinosauria (clade) > Saurischia (clade) > Sauropodomorpha (clade) > Sauropoda (clade) > Macronaria (clade) > Titanosauria (clade) > Dreadnoughtus (genus) > Dreadnoughtus schrani (species)
- Length: 26 m
- Hip height: 3.5–4.2 m
- Mass: 22–59.3 t
- Age: 84–66 million years ago (Late Cretaceous)
- Fossils found in: Cerro Fortaleza Formation (Santa Cruz Province); Argentina
- Diet: herbivore
- Described: Kenneth J. Lacovara et al., 2014
- In films: Jurassic World Dominion (2022)

Canonical page: https://dinodex.club/dinosaurs/dreadnoughtus-schrani
Last updated: 2026-09-27

## Overview

Dreadnoughtus schrani lived in southern Patagonia, Argentina, in the Late Cretaceous (Campanian-Maastrichtian). Kenneth Lacovara and colleagues named it in 2014 from two skeletons found on the east bank of the Río La Leona in Santa Cruz Province; they are kept at the Museo Padre Molina in Río Gallegos.

The holotype preserves about 45% of all the bones of a titanosaur skeleton and up to 70% of the postcranial elements, far more than any other giant titanosaur (Argentinosaurus: about 5%). Its bone histology shows the animal was still growing.

The describers estimated 59.3 tonnes from limb-bone circumference. Volumetric models by Bates et al. (2015) found this implausible and gave 22 to 38 tonnes, and Paul (2019) put it around 30 tonnes, so its mass is a textbook example of how much methods differ.

## Name meaning

"Dreadnought", Old English for "fearing nothing", for its size and after early-20th-century battleships; schrani honours Adam Schran, who supported the research (Lacovara et al. 2014).

## Sources

1. (2026). Paleobiology Database: Dreadnoughtus occurrences. The Paleobiology Database (paleobiodb.org), data service 1.2, accessed 2026-09-23. https://paleobiodb.org/data1.2/occs/list.txt?base_name=Dreadnoughtus&show=coords,paleoloc,strat,loc,ref&pgm=gplates
2. Bates, K. T., Falkingham, P. L., Macaulay, S., Brassey, C. & Maidment, S. C. R. (2015). Downsizing a giant: re-evaluating Dreadnoughtus body mass. Biology Letters 11. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2015.0215
3. Lacovara, K. J., Lamanna, M. C., Ibiricu, L. M., Poole, J. C., Schroeter, E. R., Ullmann, P. V., Voegele, K. K., Boles, Z. M., et al. (2014). A gigantic, exceptionally complete titanosaurian sauropod dinosaur from southern Patagonia, Argentina. Scientific Reports 4: 6196. https://doi.org/10.1038/srep06196
4. Paul, G. S. (2016). The Princeton Field Guide to Dinosaurs (2nd edition). Princeton University Press.
5. Paul, G. S. (2019). Determining the largest known land animal: a critical comparison of differing methods for restoring the volume and mass of extinct animals. Annals of Carnegie Museum 85(4): 335-358. https://doi.org/10.2992/007.085.0403

---

Cite as: "Dreadnoughtus schrani". DinoDex. https://dinodex.club/dinosaurs/dreadnoughtus-schrani (updated 2026-09-27).