Last weekend saw a 100-foot long animatronic dinosaur go up in flames after being struck by lightning. The three-story Sauroposeidon was part of Kansas’ Field Station: Dinosaur theme park, and by the end of the fire, only the animatronic’s damaged frame remained.
“This evening at about 8:30 p.m., Derby Fire crews were dispatched to multiple reports of a lightning strike and a Dinosaur on fire at Derby’s Field Station: Dinosaurs,” reads the Derby Fire Facebook account. “Crews were able to gain access and prevent the fire from spreading to other dinosaurs thus sparing an extinction level event.”
Thankfully, aside from the dinosaur, no injuries were reported. Steven Howe, the park’s operations manager, told local news that restoring the structure is not off the table. Cost and technical challenges currently stand between the dinosaur’s frame and its former glory, however.
“We’re talking hundreds of thousands of dollars,” Howe told KSN. “And that’s for a full replacement.”
Howe is confident that the park will move forward with some revision of the dinosaur once insurance is settled.
“There’s going to be something there,” he said. “Whether it’s this modern art sort of sculpture, or the stages of building a dinosaur, or whatever we come up with.”
