New footage showing a giant, strange looking sea creature floating in the depths of the Pacific Ocean has left researchers questioning if it's a new species.
A team of scientists spotted a strange animal on a research vessel used by the Ocean Exploration Trust.
The researchers oohed and aahed as they saw the strange creature in the video.
One of the scientists on board can be heard saying off-camera, "My mind is blown right now," as the ROV scanned the ocean floor. Another scientist joked that he wasn't on the edge of his seat.
The scientists weren't able to record video of the second individual, but they spied another odd creature nearby.
The creature looked like a flower that was roughly the size of the ROV with its long, thin, and barbed tentacles.
It was spotted on July 7 near a previously unexplored seamount in the Pacific Ocean west of Hawaii.
It was thought that they had crossed paths with Solumbellula monocephalus, also known as a Solumbellula sea pen.
Sea pens have only been seen in the Atlantic and Indian oceans, so it's possible that the scientists stumbled upon a new species.
There are weird creatures in the deep sea.
Steve Auscavitch, the expedition's lead researcher and a deep-sea biologist and post-graduate scholar at Boston University, described the sight as fascinating.
He told Live Science that "from time to time, we come across something that we never expected to see."
He said that they were at the bottom of the ocean when they saw the sea pens. The one we captured on video was large and similar to Hercules. I knew what the sea pen was when I watched the video.
Biologists on the shore helped confirm that it was a sea pen.
He could not give a specific age, but based on the animal's size, he surmised that it was older. At five or six years of age, sea pens can live a long time.
He said that Solumbellula monocephalus had never been seen in the central Pacific.
Scientists in Spain named two new genera of sea pens, Pseudumbellula and Solumbellula, after his team's discovery. The findings were published in the journal.
More research is needed to determine if this is the first Pacific Solumbellula monocephalus or a new species.
He said that findings like this are rare. We come across these things from time to time, and it really expands our horizon about where animals can live and exist in the deep sea.
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The original article was published by Live Science. The original article can be found here.
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