Divers Stunned After Spotting a Giant Glowing Blob of Baby Squids Near WWII Shipwreck
At first glance, a squid resembles “Kraken,” a sea monster, but a closer look reveals an even more magical creature that changes colors and even body patterns, shooting water spurts from its siphons, as it propels itself forward. It's also menacing with its suckers, rings, and tentacles, designed to lure and trap its prey, before chopping it into little pieces with its sharp beak.
But these otherwise aggressive creatures turn surreal when the mating season arrives. They gather at the surface and start emitting an electric blue glow to attract their mate, which is a regular sighting in Japan. Upon mating, the female squids store hundreds of thousands of eggs inside her elongated belly, only to release them all at once inside a giant sac, which drifts solitarily in the open waters. In October 2019, divers exploring Ørstafjorden in Norway were making their way back to shore after visiting a World War II shipwreck about 200 meters (656 feet) from the coast. Little did they know that they would have an encounter with this mysterious orb gliding in the dark depths.
The footage shows the team of divers spotting a gigantic gelatinous orb floating nearby. Flashing torchlights revealed that the giant bubbly orb wasn’t empty and instead, there were zillions of squishy yellow yolk-like embryos inside it. On the circumference, the orb appeared to be matted with shimmery particles, adding a subtle crystalline look to the overall display.
This stunning footage was recorded by diver Ronald Raasch and published on Deep Blue Discovery (@DeepBlueDiscovery). At this time, he was diving with two of his colleagues, Nils Baadness and Brynjar Aarnseth, aboard the research vessel REV Ocean in the cold Norwegian waters. “Floating 17 meters (55 feet) below the surface and around 15 meters (49 feet) above the sea bed, the giant, transparent orb was quickly identified by the professionals as a 10-armed squid's egg sac,” the team wrote in the description.
Raasch described the blob as a "blekksprutgeleball," translated to "squid gel ball" in Norwegian. “At first, I thought it was a giant jellyfish, but when we came a bit closer, we saw that this was [like] nothing else we had seen before. It was amazing. To see it in person was a once-in-a-lifetime moment,” Baadness told The Dodo.
According to Live Science, this is not the first sighting of such an unusual jelly blob. “Dozens of similar blobs have been sighted in waters near Norway, Spain, France, and Italy, with reports dating back 30 years,” Halldis Ringvold, a researcher with Sea Snack Norway, told Live Science. The outlet explained that the appearance of this newfound egg sac shared many similarities with the egg sacs of the southern shortfin squid, which on average contain between 50,000 and 200,000 eggs inside the sac. "The dark mass is probably ink from the female squid, who injected it while making the sphere," he said. "At the very end of the video, it is possible to see the actual squid eggs. They are very small, round, and transparent,” Ringvold said in a press release.
Smithsonian Ocean explains that these gooey embryo sacs, also called “jelly blobs” help to keep the baby squids safe from predators and parasites. The jelly-like membrane also enables the egg sac to float seamlessly and also has a steady supply of oxygen for breathing. Although the jelly blob in the footage hasn’t been studied extensively yet, the investigation of these elusive creatures would pave the way forward to understanding more mysteries of the underwater realm. “We were very lucky to be there at the right place at the right time,” Baadness told The Dodo, before adding, "We will probably not experience this ever again.”