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After Nub News last month announced that mysterious craters on Penarth beach were "likely" to be dinosaur footprints, we received a torrent of emails with paleontological bones to pick.

Most were from members of the public claiming that they knew about the prints way before our announcement (some claimed as early as the 1970s). Others made wild speculations about the dinosaur responsible for the imprints - from brontosaurus to Barney.

But the post that really caught our eye was from Chris Berry, Senior Lecturer at Cardiff University.

"For it to be claimed they had recently been discovered came as a bit of a surprise. We've been conducting research projects on them for two years!"

He says the structures (as we will call them) had been brought to the University's attention in 2018, two years before the Natural History Museum was made aware of them.

In an interview with Nub News, Chris clears up some of the confusion surrounding the discovery process and explains his interesting position on the structures: that they are either dinosaur footprints OR something far more exciting.

Understanding through misunderstanding

"So the structures were not discovered in April 2020 by [Kerry Rees], as was reported," says Chris. "The National Museum of Wales has known about them for years and I've seen pictures dating back as far as 2009 taken by French geologists who thought they were dinosaur footprints.

"Kerry's achievement was that she didn't take no for an answer when she reported the structures to the National Museum of Wales, who told her they were not footprints. She went for a second opinion, which is how the Natural History Museum got involved."

So why did the National Museum of Wales tell Kerry the structures weren't footprints? Because at the time they didn't think they were.

As Cindy Howell, fossil keeper at NMW, said in a recent BBC interview:

"We've always been in two minds about the [structures] we've seen. But we've had an expert on dinosaur footprints [from the Natural History Museum] down now and he's fairly certain."

Chris explains the museum's initial dubiousness:

"When you go and look at them, you immediately think they are dinosaur footprints. But then when you take a closer look at the geology of the surface, you realise there could well be something more complex going on, and that's what National Museum of Wales thought."

That "more complex" thing is, by nature, difficult to explain here; even experts like Chris don't fully understand it.

But it has a lot to do with a decorative stone for which Penarth is famous.

Penarth alabaster

"Penarth alabaster forms when sea water evaporates. There is a well-known layer of it in the cliffs of Penarth that has been used as a decorative stone in Insole Court and in Cardiff University.

"In Penarth alabaster you get these gypsum nodules, which are these minerals kind of like the stuff you get in your kettle. Now, these nodules are present at the site, roughly the same size as the dinosaur footprints and have formed only 30cm below them.

"The nodules form squashed-rugby-ball-like structures that displace sediment and create movement. The fascinating thing is that we've never seen the nodules produce anything like the structures we're talking about. So the structures are either dinosaur footprints, which is very exciting, or an unprecedented geological feature which is even more exciting from a geological perspective.

"No-one will go currently on record saying they definitely are footprints or they definitely aren't because the geology there is so confusing and unprecedented."

The Natural History Museum, who are no strangers to dinosaurs, have said they are likely to be prints. According to researcher there, Professor Paul Barrett: "they seem to be regularly spaced and have raised mud rims like those that form as a foot pushes into wet mud or sand."

But Chris isn't so sure.

"It is just an inkling, but we have this really complex geology right below the area with these so-called footprints. That just seems like too much of a coincidence. This is not a scientific opinion, it could be my ignorance. It all just feels like too much of a weird coincidence to be true."

When will we know for sure?

When Chris first came to us last month, I sensed a subtle tension in the air between the involved institutions.

It seemed Cardiff University, the National Museum of Wales and the Natural History Museum were struggling to find common ground. They couldn't agree on who even discovered the structures, let alone whether they were dinosaur footprints.

But it has since become clear that this spirit of healthy disagreement and correction is all part of the scientific process. It has culminated in a super-alliance of experts in various fields all working to figure out whether the structures are evidence of dinosaurs roaming what is now Penarth's coastline.

"We are very grateful to the National Museum of Wales and the University of Cardiff for sharing their insights with us," commented a National History Museum spokesperson. "As a result of these discussions, we are now working on a plan for how work might continue on this exciting find."

Unfortunately, renewed COVID restrictions have put a spanner in the works, halting the collaborative effort. Until then, only one thing is clear:

Penarth's coastline is a fascinating place.