Sue at the Field Museum

Sue and I go back a long time. She has been part of my (imaginary) world since at least 2003.
She's ferocious and enormous, and would probably devour me if we were ever to cross the same path, but it is impossible to remain indifferent to her charm.

I was in Chicago waiting for a connection flight to take me to Ottawa (those were the days I worked as Javier Solana's press officer), when I happened upon the Field Museum shop at Chicago's international airport terminal 5. I was intrigued by the t-shirts sporting a skeleton of a dinosaur with the name Sue. I bought one for me and one for Jarl and so started our interest in discovering more about Sue.

Sue is indeed a T-Rex, now celebrating 10 years at the Field Museum, although she is an old lady of some 67 million years. Nobody knows for sure that Sue is a she, but she was given the name of the paleontologist who found the fossil in South Dakota in 1990.

We visited Sue today. Georgie had heard a lot about her, and as every other child these days she too is obsessed with dinosaurs. Sue is the perfect fairy tale monster. We saw an almost real size robot of Sue at the museum. Georgie didn't seem to be scared; she shouted back at the beast every time it roared. The other children looked in amazement.

Publicity aside, Sue's fossil is impressive and worth spending time looking at. She is after all the biggest and most complete T-Rex dinosaur in the world. Just looking at the sheer strength of her anterior legs sends shivers through your spine. And we all need a fairy tale monster to keep us awake at night...

(L)