'Hidden dragon' fossil found in China is the earliest flying reptile

Scientists have found a fossil from 163 million years ago that represents the oldest known example of flying reptiles that later evolved to become the largest flying creatures in Earth’s history.

The newly identified Jurassic period creature, a species named Kryptodrakon progenitor was unearthed in the Gobi desert in northwestern China, was modest in size, with a wingspan of perhaps 1.37m. But later members of its branch of the flying reptiles known as pterosaurs were truly colossal – including Quetzalcoatlus, whose wingspan of about 11m was roughly the same as that of an F-16 fighter.