![]() “We have something like 540 shark species in the ocean there are 57 of them able to produce light - so more than 10% of the sharks,” Jérôme Mallefet, a marine biologist at the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium and lead author of a new study on the discovery, told Mongabay in an interview. On a 2020 voyage near Chatham Rise off the eastern coast of New Zealand, a team of international scientists discovered that the kitefin shark ( Dalatias licha) and two other deep-sea shark species, the blackbelly lanternshark ( Etmopterus lucifer) and the southern lanternshark ( Etmopterus granulosus), all have bioluminescent properties. But there is more to this shark than initially meets the eye: in the dark, it will emit a blue glow. The kitefin shark is a guitar-sized creature with brownish-black skin and large, gaping eyes. Further research is needed to fully understand how and why these sharks emit light.The kitefin shark, which glows blue, is the largest known vertebrate to emit bioluminescence.Researchers have discovered that three deep-sea shark species - the kitefin shark (Dalatias licha), the blackbelly lanternshark (Etmopterus lucifer), and the southern lanternshark (Etmopterus granulosus) - all have bioluminescent properties.“After I spent some time with her, and then again when we confirmed her identity as Deep Blue, it was an incredible feeling of euphoria,” Mohler said. They received surface support in boats from Danny Roberts, Tim Andrews, and Heather Armstrong. On Sunday, Deep Blue was fattening up on sperm whale flesh as the carcass drifted slowly south, away from Oahu.ĭiving with Mohler were Andrew Gray, Kimberly Jeffries, Laura Rock, and Daren Babula. The gargantuan shark generated headlines again in 2015 when Mauricio Hoyas Padilla, a Mexico-based scientist, shared footage showing the shark dwarfing divers in cages at Guadalupe Island. RELATED: 15-year-old swimmer attacked by weird type of sharkĭeep Blue, believed to measure at least 21 feet, became famous after being featured by Discovery in 2014 (with footage captured in 2013). White shark sightings off Hawaii, however, are rare. Most return to Guadalupe by early or mid-summer. Those sharks typically migrate into open ocean, as far as Hawaii, during late fall or early winter. MCSI has tagged dozens of Guadalupe Island white sharks. Probst said he compared footage captured Sunday to photos in the Guadalupe Island database, and that the ID was confirmed by Michael Domeier and Nicole Nasby Lucas of the Marine Conservation Science Institute. Probst announced the Deep Blue sighting via Twitter on Tuesday, when another enormous white shark was spotted near the whale carcass.ĭeep Blue has unique skin markings. “She followed three tiger sharks in toward the whale carcass, and her sheer size made them look like barracudas.” “My first reaction was just disbelief,” Mark Mohler, who captured the images for this story, told For The Win Outdoors. ![]() The sighting of “Deep Blue” off Oahu was remarkable because the handful of previous sightings were documented 2,600 miles away at Guadalupe Island off Mexico’s Baja California peninsula. A strikingly massive great white shark, one of the largest ever documented, was spotted by divers in Hawaii on Sunday as the apex predator feasted on a sperm whale carcass.
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