Oarfish Sighting Off San Diego Sparks Earthquake Speculation

A group of friends were on a normal kayaking adventure near La Jolla Cove, or so they thought. What they found was a nearly 4-meter (12-foot) long sea creature: a rare and massive oarfish.

According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the oarfish takes the record as the world’s largest bony fish, up to 11 meters (36 feet) long and weighing up to 270 kilograms (600 pounds). This particular one was also found dead and floating off the San Diego coast. This is only the 20th time an oarfish has been spotted in California waters since the early 1900s, according to Ben Frable, who heads Marine Vertebrate Collection at UC San Diego’s Institution of Oceanography.

“Oarfish are rarely seen in California,” Frable said. “They tend to stay deep in the open ocean and don’t often venture toward the shore.”

The kayakers quickly contacted authorities so that they could rescue the oarfish, bring it ashore for further examination, and take pictures of the anomaly.

“There is some limited study on oarfish already, but direct interactions in natural habitat are exceedingly rare,” Frable said.

NOAA will conduct a necropsy to determine the cause of death. A genetic study will also be conducted to provide further information about the species, anatomy, habitat, and the role played within the deep sea’s food chain. “Oarfish have long fascinated scientists with their elongated silvery bodies, large eyes and distinguished crest that resemble mythical sea serpents,” Frable continued.

The oarfish have long held an association with doom in Japanese folklore. Known as “Ryugu no Tsukai,” or “messenger from the Dragon God’s Palace,” legend states their appearance near the ocean’s surface is a harbinger of an earthquake or tsunami. This has become popular folklore in Japan in recent years, after several oarfish were found along the coast of Japan before a devastating earthquake in 2011.

Whatever the folklores, there is no scientific proof behind the sighting of oarfish and seismic activities. The results of the 2019 Seismological Society of America bulletin report entitled “Is Japanese Folklore concerning deep‐sea fish appearance a real precursor of earthquakes?” did find evidence of any difference between oarfish strandings and earthquakes.

Hiroyuki Motomure, a Kagoshima University professor, said the legend was no more than superstition. “There is no scientific evidence to suggest that the two events are connected,” he said to the New York Post.”I believe these fish tend to rise to the surface when their health declines, and they’re carried by the water currents, which is why they’re often found dead.”

The same has also been said by Dr. Milton Love at the Marine Science Institute of California in the following words: “There is no evidence that I know of to suggest that oarfish come into shallow waters in response to, or in preparation for, earthquakes.”

The find in San Diego has brought on both joking and concerned comments on the web. A few headed over to Reddit to talk about the legend, one of whom explained, “Oarfish are thought to be the origin of many ‘giant sea serpent’ stories and are often seen as bad omens because their appearance might indicate significant changes in ocean currents, which can precede hurricanes.”

One even predicted, “Big earthquake coming.

One commenter wrote, “There was an earthquake felt in Poway this morning.”

Until there’s evidence to the contrary, I’m inclined to think that the oarfish aren’t merely responding to seismic events; they’re actually triggering them and then escaping the consequences.

“It makes sense that their appearance could be the first sign of an impending earthquake. Honestly, it makes me wonder if something more is happening every time we see them,” someone else added.

Source: Bored Panda