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For 40 years, the skeleton cast, 4.25 meters (14 ft) high and
21 meters long, has been the first sight to greet museum
visitors as they pass through the main entrance on London's
Cromwell Road.
The 292-bone cast was presented to the museum by Scottish-born
American industrialist Andrew Carnegie in 1905, but did not make
the move into the entrance hall until 1979.
Dippy's last day on show in London will be Jan. 4 next year and
conservators will then spend 12 months preparing a delicate
plaster-of-Paris cast for its journey.
In all, the huge skeleton will visit eight different locations
around Britain, ending in the eastern English city of Norwich in
2020.
"We wanted Dippy to visit unusual locations so he can draw in
people who may not traditionally visit a museum," said Museum
Director Sir Michael Dixon.
"Making iconic items accessible to as many people as possible is
at the heart of what museums give to the nation, so we have
ensured that Dippy will still be free to view at all tour
venues," he added in a statement.
Diplodocus was first described as a new type of dinosaur in 1878
by Professor Othniel C. Marsh at Yale University. The herbivore
species lived sometime between 156 and 145 million years ago and
belongs to a group called sauropods, meaning 'lizard feet'.
The museum plans to fill the dinosaur-sized gap in its entrance
hall with a 100-year-old skeleton of a blue whale.
(Reporting by Stephen Addison; editing by Costas Pitas)
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