“The Big Dino Dig” at Ardingly College in Sussex

Staff and students at Ardingly College in Sussex, with help from expert paleontologists from Imperial College London, have discovered a number of significant fossils within a spoil heap formed during construction work.

Ardingly College sits on the Hastings Beds Group, a series of rock units that includes groups such as the Cuckfield Stone member, Grinstead Clay formation and Ardingly sandstone. These date from the Valanginian stage of the Cretaceous, which stretched from approximately 140 million years ago.

Having previously drilled boreholes as part of the initial site investigation, Southern Testing were delighted to be asked to attend a recent open day at Ardingly College, quickly dubbed by the local press as a ‘The Big Dino Dig’.

Southern Testing Engineering Geologists Andy Holley and Jamie Codd spent a morning discussing and explaining the finds with local schoolchildren, teachers and the community, with television coverage from the BBC Newsround programme.

The photographs below show a pieces of fossilised wood found that day.

Read more on the He is a Palaeontologist blog.