VIDEO: Rare goblin shark found off Australia

March 4, 2015

John Hopton for redOrbit.com – @Johnfinitum

Two places that are bountiful sources of wonderfully terrifying creatures: Australia and the ocean. Combine the two, and there is seemingly no end to the array of eye-opening specimens.

This time: It’s the goblin shark.

The Australian Museum recently received a specimen of one of these, only the fourth ever to be acquired by the Sydney museum, with the first two collected in the 1980s. Described as an “alien of the deep”, goblins live way down–about 2900 feet (900 meters)–and are rarely caught by humans.

The sharks’ most notable feature, alongside a set of “nail-like” teeth that rival any dental terror in the shark world, is a long, protruding snout. Rather than looking like goblins, the 125 million-year-old “living fossils” actually look like ocean-dwelling versions of proboscis monkeys, platypuses, or unicorns if nature had got drunk and decided it’d had just about enough of cutesiness.

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Rare goblin shark caught in US

Prehistoric-looking pink shark caught in Florida has only been seen a handful of times

By Josie Ensor

2:54PM BST 03 May 2014

Shrimp fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico have caught a goblin shark – a species so rare that one has not been seen for 10 years.

The 18ft-long pink predator was caught in a shrimp net off Key West, Florida.

The crew were shocked to find the prehistoric-looking shark thrashing around with the rest of the haul.

It has a long snout hiding racks of sharp teeth and is often called a “living fossil”.

Thought to swim in the deep water of Japan and the Gulf, it is only the second known sighting in the area.

“I didn’t even know what it was,” said Carl Moore, a fisherman. “I didn’t get the tape measure out because that thing’s got some wicked teeth. They could do some damage.

“My three-year-old grandson just loves sharks, so I’ve been taking pictures of every one we find. When I showed him this one he said, 'Wow, Pappa!’”

Much to the disappointment of scientists, Mr Moore decided to snap a quick photo of the shark with his mobile then release it back into the water.

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Knifenose Chimaera, Arctic Mystery Fish, Is Even Weirder Than It Looks (PHOTO)

A university researcher in Canada claims he knows the identity of a mysterious sea creature that was recovered by a fishing boat in the Arctic Ocean.

Some people postulated that the Arctic mystery fish was a goblin shark, but Nigel Hussey, a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Windsor who's made a name for himself discovering hybrid manta rays, says it belongs to the long-nosed chimaera family -- fish with cartilage skeletons that have lived in the oceans for more than 350 million years.

The photo went viral after it was posted to CBC North's Facebook page Nov. 10.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/20/knifenose-chimaera-arctic-mystery-fish-photo_n_4309018.html?utm_hp_ref=weird-news