Pax Christi!
One of the most important research projects that Kolbe scientists have carried out since the founding of our apostolate has been the excavation of dinosaur and human footprints together in the same sedimentary rock and the C-14 dating of dinosaur bones. A few weeks ago, retired chemist Hugh Miller, biologist Pamela Acker, and engineer Pedro Aguado led a group of Catholic high school students to look for dinosaur and human footprints in the sedimentary rocks of the Paluxy River bed near Glen Rose, Texas. What follows is a slightly-edited version of Hugh Miller's report on the expedition:
Carl Baugh of the Creation Evidence Museum (CEM) gave the group three days to finish the dig begun July 3-7 that exposed about 50 square feet of the third stratum for the first time. Biology students from a Catholic high school in San Antonio, Texas, cleaned out the eroded dinosaur footprints from previous years which were two to three inches deep and received a personal tour of the two-floor museum by Dr. Carl Baugh after which they were allowed to roam the museum to look at the artifacts and record their observations.
Figure 1. This photo shows one set of therapod prints [probably Acrocanthosaurus] going upstream and another set going downstream in the Paluxy River bed. These dinosaur tracks are normally two to three inches deep whereas the human ones are never more than 1/2 to 3/4 inch deep and erode very fast. Our Kolbe team has obtained four concordant ages for the Acro from 23,000 to 31,000 years +/- which was excavated two miles upstream which was our source of bone fragments for dating. Of course, soft tissue in some dinosaur bones and dinosaur depictions world-wide suggest that even the C-14 ages may be too old. The greater strength of the earth's magnetic field in the past would explain this, as the cosmic rays that collide with Nitrogen atoms in the atmosphere and change them into Carbon-14 atoms would not have been able to penetrate the atmosphere as easily. As a consequence, there may have been very little production of C-14 in the atmosphere prior to the Flood. If scientists take this into account, the 20,000 to 30,000 C-14 ages can easily (and ought to) be reduced to 4000 to 5000 years in keeping with the Biblical chronology.
Kolbe advisor and geological engineer Rachel Dilly then flew a drone over the 400-foot long, 15-20-foot wide shelf along the Paluxy River famous for containing fossil dinosaur and human footprints together in stark contradiction to the hypothesis of man's evolution from an amoeba. The students arrived about 10 AM on October 9 on a small chartered bus and left about 3PM after eating their lunch among the dinosaur footprints-quite a quick but fruitful awakening to the Abrupt Appearance of all species as revealed in the sacred history of Genesis.
Figure 2. Hugh Miller's son Kevin excavates a dinosaur track in the Paluxy River bed.
The team found three fossil Apatosaurus-type dinosaur footprints and one three-toed dinosaur footprint by expanding the excavation site from 50 to 100 or more square feet. It appears that the third stratum had significant activity during what was probably the early stage of the flood of Noah. The second stratum contained over 300 dinosaur and 80 human footprints, so there is good reason to continue the search for fossil human footprints in the third stratum. Surprising all was the fact that the second stratum was only 4-6 inches thick with very little clay above it as compared with the 12-inch thick #1 limestone stratum with three inches of clay between #1 and #2. It was refreshing to have Catholic high school students actively observing an excavation for dinosaur and human footprints and visiting a museum oriented towards demonstrating the absurdity of the theory of evolution for a change.
The land owner came to the excavation site for short periods each day to observe progress and seemed delighted in the five or so separate fly-overs of the drone which he watched [out of drone's fly-over area] with us while discussing many topics for over an hour. He is surrounded by evolutionary tourist attractions in Dinosaur State Valley and federal and local politicians and scientists who seem to frown on doing any research that rocks the evolutionary boat. This has put pressure on him to limit CEM research in the Valley. He only charges $500/dig. In comparison it costs $600 to just C-14 date one dinosaur bone sample on an Accelerated Mass Spectrometer. We have already put forth the research idea to Dr. Baugh of allowing CEM to take out a few trees along the shelf and follow two human trails that disappear into the river bank under 12 inches of the top stratum in hopes of finding more footprints of dinosaurs and humans in the same rock.
Figure 3. Kolbe leader Pedro Aguado helps to expose dinosaur tracks in the Paluxy River bed.
While Hugh Miller was preparing this report, a mutual friend informed us of yet another discovery of red and white blood cell-like structures, collagen and cholesterol in an ichthyosaur bone dated to 182.7 million years ago in the early Jurassic, according to evolutionary mythology. As evolutionists do their best to speculate how fragile structures like these could be preserved for hundreds of millions of years, the Paluxy evidence points to the simple and obvious explanation--the global Flood in the days of Noah, approximately 4,500 years ago.
Please keep the Kolbe Center in your prayers.
Yours in Christ through the Immaculata,
Hugh Owen
