A stem-relative of dragon- and damselflies, Brunellopteron norradi Béthoux, Deregnaucourt and Norrad gen. et spec. nov., is documented based on a specimen found at Robertson Point (Grand Lake, New Brunswick, Canada; Sunburry Creek Formation; early Moscovian, Pennsylvanian) and preserving the basal half of a hindwing. A comparative analysis of the evolution of wing venation in early odonates demonstrates that it belongs to a yet poorly documented subset of species. Specifically, it displays a MP+CuA fusion, a CuA+CuP fusion, and a CuP+AA fusion, but lacks the ‘extended’ MP+Cu/CuA fusion and the ‘extended’ (CuP/CuA+CuP)+AA fusion which occurrence is typical of most Odonata, including Meganeura-like species. The occurrence of intercalary veins suggests that its closest relative might be Gallotypus oudardi Nel, Garrouste and Roques, 2008, from the Moscovian of northern France.

The two reflectance transformation imaging (RTI) files provided in this dataset document the specimen NBMG 21589, deposited at the New Brunswick Museum (Palaeontology collection; Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada). Each RTI file was generated using 42 photographs, themselves taken using a ca. 30-cm diameter automated light dome driving a digital camera Canon EOS 5D Mark III coupled to a Canon MP-E 65 mm macro lens (Canon, Tokyo, Japan) . Original photographs were optimized using Adobe Photoshop CS6 (Adobe Systems, San Jose, CA, USA) before RTI-processing, itself achieved using the RTIbuilder software (Cultural Heritage Imaging).