Jakarta – There are some ocean depths that humans cannot swim to. Fortunately, technological developments allow us to rely on sophisticated and powerful cameras that can be dropped into the ocean depths, to see what’s there.
For the record, humans can only dive to a depth of about 300 meters, and to reach deeper, we need special equipment such as submarines to dive.
Well, technology can reach places that the human body cannot. So when scientists on an expedition to the Tonga Trench in the Pacific Ocean dropped a camera there, they were able to clearly see what was underneath.
Beyond a certain depth lies a world that is relatively untouched by the world above it so anything that falls into it requires investigation by deep-sea dwellers.
Luckily for us, that means scientists got excellent footage of a huge Pacific Sleeper Shark swimming up to the camera and biting it slightly.
As quoted from LadBible, Thursday (12/12/2024) it sounds terrible. But this is quite normal shark behavior because they don’t have hands and have to investigate things using their mouths.
One of the researchers, Dr. Jessica Kolbusz, explained that this footage was taken at a depth of 1,400 meters and somewhere west of the Tonga Trench.
She said that the shark with the scientific name Somniosus pacificus can measure up to 4.4 meters, although the largest among them can be over seven meters long.
As for this magnificent yet slightly frightening creature from the deep blue sea, the expert explains that it is a female shark.
“This observation took place west of the Tonga Trench, we assume that this shark is quite large, about 3.5 meters, at a depth of 1,400 meters and due to the absence of observable pincers on the pelvic fins, we identified this shark as a female,” he said.
“She went straight for the camera, from this vantage point we could see the entire contents of the shark’s mouth. It wasn’t long before she realized it didn’t taste good and ate the bait. The temperature was about 2.5 degrees Celsius, which makes sense because we know they prefer cooler water,” he added.
Luckily for the scientists, the shark quickly switched to the fish they had placed next to the camera as bait, which prevented it from damaging the deep-sea camera that was dropped into the ocean depths.
After munching on the bait attached to the camera device, the giant animal then swam away, giving a good idea of just how big the shark was.
Pacific Sleeper Sharks are very impressive creatures that can hunt quietly as they don’t make much noise while moving through the water. They tend to feed on fish that live on the ocean floor. Based on another study of the shark’s stomach contents, the creature also seems to favor the Giant Pacific Octopus (Enteroctopus dofleini).
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