Never before seen flying pterosaurs heading to Okanagan Science Centre

With only a day to go before its official opening, Matt Evans seems remarkably calm as he drills two-by-fours together, next to a life-sized T. rex head.

He’s hung a couple of huge pterosaur skeletons from the ceiling, while a colleague wearing a Jurassic Park T-shirt paints a display stand.

Within a day or so, the gallery room at the Okanagan Science Centre in Vernon will be home to, Pterosauria: Evolution of Flight, the centre’s summer exhibition.

The exhibit focuses on pterosaurs, flying reptiles which were the first creatures to take to the skies.

“They’re a really interesting species and just seeing how flight evolved throughout prehistoric times is really cool,” Evans told iNFOnews.ca.

The vast majority of the species on display have never been seen before in model form, and come courtesy of Evan’s company BioBuild Studios.

The West Kelowna-based firm only set up a year ago, producing what Evan calls “luxury Lego.” The company makes life-size dinosaur fossil kits for people to build, and found out quite quickly that museums and science centres were interested in what he was doing.

Unlike the very expensive polyurethane dinosaur casts found in most museums, Evan’s uses a 3D printer to produce the scientifically accurate skeletons and fossils. They’re lightweight and can move.

“We are the first company in the world to do what we do using the techniques that we utilize,” he said. “Everything that we provide comes with articulating jaws, so for the first time, you can actually see how these animals would utilize their bite forces.”

Pterosauria: Evolution of Flight is the company’s first full exhibition and will be at the Okanagan Science Centre for the next three months.

“People are always looking for change, and so we try and change it up as frequently as we can financially do it,” science centre director of operations Samantha Primmer said.

Primmer said different companies design and lease out exhibits to science centres and museums, and only a few exist in Canada. The not-for-profit science centre has to take into account the centre’s small gallery, the cost, which can be more than $100,000, as well as keeping things fresh and with no repetition.

“We try to mix it up all the time. And we try and hit the BC school curriculum as well,” Primmer said.

As 85% of the species at Pterosauria have never been seen before, the centre is hoping the new exhibit is a big draw.

“We’re really hoping that it catches the kids’ attention and the parents, and it’s a different educational opportunity,” she said.

The exhibit will include a life-size Hatzegopteryx, a giraffe-sized pterosaur which Evans describes as a “murder eagle,” and a 17-foot-wide Nyctosaurus.

There are 28 specimens in total, and the world’s first articulating Tyrannosaurus Rex skull.

“Even though the exhibit itself is on pterosaurs, we had to fit the king in here just because everyone just loves T. rex,” Evans said.

There will be the skull of a Quetzalcoatlus, the largest flying creature that ever existed on the face of the planet.

Another big favourite is the Velociraptors, which he stresses is not like the movie Jurassic Park.

“We actually have a life-size Velociraptor, a real Velociraptor,” he said.

Along with the models, there are plenty of hands-on interactive aspects of the exhibit, giving kids and their parents the chance to build their own pterosaur.

The science centre says while it’s educational, it’s also fun and exciting.

The exhibit comes weeks after the centre suffered a small fire but with long-lasting impact. While the structure wasn’t damaged, smoke caused havoc throughout the buildings, causing a huge amount of damage.

Pterosauria: Evolution of Flight is scheduled to open later this week.

For more information, go here.