August 20th 2024.
On August 10, a team of researchers and snorkelers joined forces to recover a peculiar creature from La Jolla Cove in California. This creature, also known as a "doomsday fish", was discovered by a group of snorkelers and kayakers off the coast of Southern California. As they were exploring the cove, they spotted a large 12-foot oarfish - unfortunately, it was already dead.
It was a rare encounter, as the Scripps Institution of Oceanography pointed out in a Facebook post. They mentioned that only 20 oarfish have been found in California since 1901. The images of the discovery showed the long, serpent-like fish floating at the surface of the ocean, alongside smiling swimmers and a kayaker.
The oarfish had a unique appearance, with its silvery color, gray and black spots, and red hair-like strips growing from its forehead. According to the Ocean Conservancy, oarfish have been given the ominous nickname of "doomsday fish" because they are seen as harbingers of bad news and disasters in certain parts of the world.
The conservancy explained that in some cultures, the legend is that if you spot an oarfish, it is a warning sign from a higher power that a disaster, such as an earthquake, is soon to occur. In fact, just before a devastating earthquake in 2011, 20 oarfish washed ashore in Japan.
The oarfish found in La Jolla Cove was a whopping 12 feet long. The snorkelers and kayakers knew this was a rare find and immediately notified a lifeguard to help transport the fish to a NOAA facility. With the assistance of California Sea Grant and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries Service members, the group was able to get the oarfish to the facility.
At the NOAA facility, scientists will conduct a necropsy to try and determine the cause of death for this mysterious creature. Scripps assistant director of communications, Brittany Hook, told KXAN that thanks to the efforts of these locals, scientists will have the opportunity to further study this elusive species. The oarfish will become part of the Marine Vertebrate Collection at Scripps, which is one of the largest collections of deep-sea fish in the world.
If anyone happens to come across a "fishy find" like this one, they are encouraged to notify lifeguards and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. It seems that this is not the only strange fish to turn up along the US coast recently. Just a few months before this discovery, a rare, round 7.3-foot long hoodwinker sunfish washed ashore on Oregon's northern coast. This species was first known to humans in 2017 and has only been seen a few times in the Pacific, Australia, and New Zealand. Unlike the oarfish, they have not been linked to the end of the world.
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