ROV SuBastian / Schmidt Ocean Institute
The colossal squid, the largest invertebrate on the planet, has finally been filmed, 100 years after it was discovered. Scientists on another recent expedition also captured the first confirmed footage of the glacial glass squid.
With a name like colossal squid, one might think it would be gigantic, but the juvenile squid that the researchers captured on film is just 12 inches in length. However, fully-grown colossal squids are actually huge and are estimated to be up to 23 feet in length and weigh as much as 1,100 pounds.
It was captured on camera at a depth of 1,968 feet by the Schmidt Ocean Institute’s remotely operated vehicle (ROV) SuBastian on March 9 during a 35-day expedition near the South Sandwich Islands in the South Atlantic Ocean. The colossal squid was first identified 100 years ago, but this is the first time it has ever been filmed in its natural habitat.
“It’s exciting to see the first in situ footage of a juvenile colossal and humbling to think that they have no idea that humans exist,” said Dr. Kat Bolstad of the Auckland University of Technology, one of the independent scientific experts the team consulted to verify the footage. “For 100 years, we have mainly encountered them as prey remains in whale and seabird stomachs and as predators of harvested toothfish.”
Not only that, on January 25, on a different expedition, researchers were able to capture the footage of the glacial glass squid. The footage, taken at a depth of 2,254 feet in the Bellingshausen Sea near Antarctica, shows that particular glass squid species alive in its natural environment for the first time ever.
ROV SuBastian / Schmidt Ocean Institute
“The first sighting of two different squids on back-to-back expeditions is remarkable and shows how little we have seen of the magnificent inhabitants of the Southern Ocean,” said Schmidt Ocean Institute’s executive director, Dr. Jyotika Virmani. “Fortunately, we caught enough high-resolution imagery of these creatures to allow the global experts, who were not on the vessel, to identify both species.”