The largest T-rex di­nosaur ever found is com­ing to Trinidad. She's 42 feet long and 12 feet tall�at the hips. She's 67 mil­lion-years-old and her name is Sue. And, on April 11, this roy­al mem­ber of the di­nosaur fam­i­ly will set foot on Trinida­di­an soil. Sue was a Tyran­nosaurus rex that roamed North Amer­i­ca about 67 mil­lion years ago, one of the last di­nosaur species and one of the largest flesh-eaters to have ever in­hab­it­ed the Earth. For­tu­nate­ly, hu­mans weren't yet around by the time Sue be­came ex­tinct, or this "Tyrant Lizard King," with its pow­er­ful jaws and mas­sive ser­rat­ed steak-knife teeth, might have made a meal of us.

This tour will be the first time a di­nosaur ex­hi­bi­tion has come to the Caribbean. The pub­lic will have the once-in-a-life­time chance to step back in time–way, way back–to the era of the di­nosaurs and in­ter­act with its world. A T-rex Named Sue is one of the most suc­cess­ful ex­hi­bi­tions out of the USA and has been seen by 20 mil­lion vis­i­tors around the world. Sue is the largest, most com­plete, best-pre­served Tyran­nosaurus rex ever dis­cov­ered, and Cayenne In­ter­na­tion­al Events–a Lon­don-based or­gan­i­sa­tion that com­bines ed­u­ca­tion with en­ter­tain­ment through in­ter­na­tion­al events in sci­ence, art, nat­ur­al his­to­ry and cul­ture–is pleased to give Trin­bag­o­ni­ans the chance to come face to face with this ex­tra­or­di­nary gi­ant.

The star of the ex­hi­bi­tion is a ful­ly ar­tic­u­lat­ed, life-sized skele­ton cast of Sue's fos­sils which will stun view­ers with its sheer size and de­tail (her skull alone is al­most five feet long.) In­ter­ac­tive ex­hibits al­low you to ex­pe­ri­ence Sue's move­ment, vi­sion, and sense of smell for your­self. Com­bin­ing cut­ting-edge re­search with award-win­ning de­sign, the Mu­se­um has cre­at­ed me­chan­i­cal mod­els and in­ter­ac­tive pods that al­low you to take a peek in­to the Cre­ta­ceous world through the eyes of a T-rex and a Tricer­atops (the one that looks like a rhi­noc­er­os.)

A GIRL NAMED SUE

Named af­ter Sue Hen­drick­son, a com­mer­cial fos­sil hunter who dis­cov­ered the bones on a Cheyenne Riv­er In­di­an Reser­va­tion in South Dako­ta in 1990, Sue soon be­came the fo­cus of an in­tense le­gal bat­tle re­gard­ing own­er­ship, which in­volved the FBI and the Na­tion­al Guard. The courts even­tu­al­ly ruled that the re­mains be­longed to the ranch­er on whose land it was dis­cov­ered. He de­cid­ed to sell Sue at pub­lic auc­tion. On Oc­to­ber 4, 1997, the auc­tion took place at Sothe­by's auc­tion house in New York. To en­sure that Sue would be pre­served for fu­ture gen­er­a­tions of sci­en­tists and vis­i­tors, The Field Mu­se­um in Chica­go, with sup­port from Mc­Don­ald's and Walt Dis­ney, pur­chased Sue for US$8.4 mil­lion.

It took two years of painstak­ing work to re­move Sue's bones from the rock that had en­cased them for 67 mil­lion years. Af­ter the bones were ful­ly as­sem­bled, The Field Mu­se­um made ex­act, ful­ly ar­tic­u­lat­ed repli­cas so that peo­ple around the world would have the op­por­tu­ni­ty to view and study Sue. At 90 per cent com­plete and ex­quis­ite­ly pre­served, Sue is the most cel­e­brat­ed mem­ber of its species�and she will soon be in Trinidad. For more in­for­ma­tion, e-mail in­fo@cayenne-events.com or call 296-8541