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What a strange thing it must be to become a fossil.
恐龍變成化石是件多么奇妙的事情啊。
Say you live a full life for a Diplodocus dinosaur, swinging your enormously long tail across your Jurassic world for 70 or so years.
假如你是只梁龍，活了充實的一生，在侏羅紀世界搖擺著碩大無比的長尾巴大約70年的時間。
Then you die -- but in such extraordinary circumstances that, against all odds, your bones are buried and transformed over time into stone.
然后你死了--但死去的情況特殊，好巧不巧，骨骸被埋住，隨著歲月流逝變成了石頭。
Mountains rise and wear away around you. Rivers come and go. Glaciers rumble overhead. Your bones endure.
山巒在你身邊隆起又蝕平。河川來了又去。冰川隆隆經過你頭上。而你的骨頭保存了下來。
Even stranger, a hundred or more million years later, volcanic activity comes to dominate the area.
更妙的是，1億年或更久之后，火山活動主宰了這個地區。
When the superheated fluids eventually cool and drain away, your stony bones have become green, highlighted here and there with red patches like roasted meat.
等到過熱的液體終于冷卻、退去時，你石化的骨頭變成了綠色，處處是一塊塊顯眼的紅色，像烤肉一樣。
And then the strangest turn of all: You return to the surface after an absence of 150 million years, and there you're discovered, extricated, and reassembled by some unimaginable new species in a bizarre new world.
接下來的轉折再奇妙不過了：你在闊別1億5000萬年后回到地表，在一個古怪的新世界里，某個超乎想像的新物種發現、解救、重組了你。
Step 1: discover and dig
第一步：發現、挖掘
A team from the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County (NHMLAC) first spotted the sauropod dinosaur they call Gnatalie in 2007 after erosion revealed a single leg bone beside a bluff in southeastern Utah.
2007年，猶他州東南部一座懸崖旁，有一根腿骨因侵蝕而暴露出來之后，洛杉磯自然史博物館的一個團隊首次發現了這只蜥腳類恐龍，他們稱之為蚋塔莉。
What they found underneath brought them back to the dig site for nine more summers.
他們在地底下發現的東西，讓他們重回挖掘地點，又待了九個夏天。
The jumble of bones -- Diplodocus, Camarasaurus, Allosaurus, Stegosaurus, and others -- had been swept together by the rivers of their day into a dinosaur logjam.
那堆骨頭里有梁龍、圓頂龍、異特龍、劍龍等恐龍的骨頭，被當時的河流卷走，統統混雜在一起。
Even the reconstructed specimen slated to go on display at the museum this fall is not a single dinosaur but combines parts from two or more individuals of the same species found at the site.
重建的樣本預計今年秋天在博物館登場，但就連那個樣本的骨頭也不是都來自同一只恐龍，而是由挖掘地點里兩只以上的同物種個體的不同部位結合而成。
The identity of that species, which may be new to science, has yet to be determined.
那個物種有待鑒別，可能是科學上的新種。
But with its long neck and tail and four sturdy legs, it shares many of the characteristics of the genus Diplodocus.
不過它有長頸、長尾和結實的四肢，這許多的特征都和梁龍屬相同。
The nickname Gnatalie came unromantically from the tiny gnats that maddened team members the first year of excavation.
“蚋塔莉這暖稱一點也不浪漫，源自挖掘的第一年令團隊成員苦不堪言的細小蚊蚋。
They scheduled later digs for high summer, preferring the risk of dehydration and heatstroke to gnat bites.
他們把之后的挖掘排在夏天最炎熱的時候，寧可冒著脫水和中暑的風險，也不想被蚊蚋叮咬。
Among other routine hazards at the dig site, mountain lions left their tracks in the dirt, and rattlesnakes sometimes sheltered under tarps.
挖掘場還有其他常見的危險，譬如在泥地上留下腳印的美洲獅，響尾蛇有時也會躲在油布底下。
On one occasion a lightning bolt hit the top of a nearby bluff, and a lone juniper tree burst into flame. People scattered for shelter.
還有一次，一道閃電打中附近的懸崖頂，一棵孤零零的刺柏起火燃燒，眾人四散尋找掩護。
Because the site was accessible, a long day's drive from Los Angeles, the museum team saw it as a chance to show people how dinosaur science gets done, with volunteers, donors, and students doing hammer-and-chisel work.
由于挖掘地點交通方便，離洛杉磯只有一天車程，所以博物館團隊認為這是很好的機會，可以讓大家見識一下恐龍科學是如何進行的，提供志愿者、贊助者和學生親手拿工具挖鑿的體驗。
Planning dinner one night, team members conducted a head count and realized they had 50 people in camp. For some, it was the first time they'd slept in a tent.
有一天晚上，團隊成員在計劃晚餐的時候數了人頭，發現營地里有50人。有些人是這輩子第一次睡在帳棚里。
The abundance of specimens also complicated the dig.
樣本豐富，也讓挖掘工作更復雜。
"You're playing pick-up sticks with a bunch of dinosaur bones," says NHMLAC paleontologist Alyssa Bell. "They're all tangled and locked together."
洛杉磯自然史博物館的古生物學家艾莉莎·貝爾說：“就像用一堆恐龍骨頭在玩插竹簽游戲。骨頭全部交纏卡在一起?！?/div>
In 2014 the team discovered what turned out to be an entire neck, back, and pelvis still fused together in stone.
2014年，團隊發現了新東西，是一塊融合了完整的頸部、背部和骨盆的石頭。
"I remember us just standing there scratching our heads and trying to figure out how on earth we're gonna get all these apart," says Bell.
貝爾說：“我記得我們就這么站在那里搔著頭，思考我們究竟該怎么把這些東西分開來?！?/div>
The excavation process entails trenching around blocks of stone containing the fossils and digging under them, leaving temporary pedestals for support.
挖掘過程需要在含有化石的石塊周圍挖溝，并在其下方挖掘，留下臨時基座作為支撐。
Jackets of burlap and plaster are placed around the fossils to protect them.
化石用粗麻布和石膏做成的外殼保護。
At the start, the crew managed to keep the jackets at a weight the workers could lift out by hand. But they soon progressed to jackets weighing a ton or more, requiring heavy machinery for the lifting.
一開始，團隊設法把石膏套維持在工人可以徒手搬出來的重量。但石膏套的重量很快就增加到1公噸以上，需要使用重型機具才能舉起。
When the time came to extract a giant pelvis, "they had ropes on either side and teams of people rocking it back and forth," says Stephanie Abramowicz, the museum illustrator at the dig.
史蒂芬妮·亞柏拉莫維茲是博物館派往挖掘現場的插畫師，她說，到了要把一塊龐大的骨盆取出來時，“他們把繩子固定在兩側，好幾組人來回搖動石膏套?！?/div>
The moment it broke free, there was a crack of thunder.
松脫出來的那一瞬間，發出雷電般的劈啪聲。
"It was very clear Gnatalie was speaking to us, released from the ground, ready to live another life," says Abramowicz.
亞柏拉莫維茲說：蚋塔莉從地下釋放出來，顯然在和我們說話，準備開啟新的一生?！?/p>
| 重點單詞 | 查看全部解釋 | |||
| drain | [drein] |
想一想再看 n. 下水道，排水溝，消耗 |
||
| determined | [di'tə:mind] |
想一想再看 adj. 堅毅的，下定決心的 |
||
| temporary | ['tempərəri] |
想一想再看 adj. 暫時的，臨時的 |
聯想記憶 | |
| burst | [bə:st] |
想一想再看 n. 破裂，陣，爆發 |
||
| protect | [prə'tekt] |
想一想再看 vt. 保護，投保 |
聯想記憶 | |
| paleontologist | [,pæliɔn'tɔlədʒist] |
想一想再看 n. 古生物學者 =palaeontologist |
||
| volcanic | [vɔl'kænik] |
想一想再看 adj. 火山的，猛烈的 |
||
| extract | ['ekstrækt,iks'trækt] |
想一想再看 n. 榨出物，精華，摘錄 |
聯想記憶 | |
| tangled | ['tæŋɡld] |
想一想再看 adj. 紊亂的；糾纏的；纏結的；復雜的 |
||
| dominate | ['dɔmineit] |
想一想再看 v. 支配，占優勢，俯視 |
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