The Smithsonian's Museum of Natural History will have a new resident on Tuesday.
For the first time, the museum will house a Tyrannosaurus rex specimen, a 38-foot, 7-ton fossil that is coming special delivery from all the way across the country, National Geographic reported.
Discovered close to the Fort Peck reservoir in Montana, the dinosaur has been at the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, Mont., for almost two decades and will now be part of the Smithsonian for 50 years. Because the Museum of Natural History didn't have a T. rex specimen, the Montana institution agreed to lend one of its own.
The coup is on a level comparable to when the museum acquired the Hope Diamond in 1929, museum spokesman Randall Kremer told The Guardian. The Wankel T. rex, named after Kathy Wankel, the Montana rancher who discovered it, will be part of the Smithsonian's new dinosaur hall planned for 2019.
The massive dinosaur is being shipped by FedEx to Washington after the delicate process of dismantling the exhibit and wrapping every bone. The first step is to create an "exit inventory," which is a documentation of each bone complete with a picture and a text description.
Next, the bones are individually wrapped in plaster and burlap and packed into crates surrounded by foam that keeps them from moving, Patrick Leiggi, administrative director of paleontology at the Museum of the Rockies, told National Geographic.
Finally, workers secure the lids on each crate and put on a special seal.
"It's like crime scene tape," said Michael Trimble, a civilian archaeologist who heads the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' office in St. Louis, Miss., told National Geographic. "You can't get into the crate without breaking this [seal]."
After a four-day trip, the dinosaur is scheduled to arrive at the museum Tuesday morning. Curating the specimen and creating an inventory will take place over the next six months; during that period, the public will be able to see the specimen's bones spread on the museum floor.
Once the inventory is complete, the T. rex will take a trip to Canada, where a specialty company makes customized cradles and supports for fossil exhibits. The dinosaur will then be kept in storage at the Smithsonian until the new dinosaur hall exhibit opens in fall 2019.
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