Giant Squid Caught on Film 551
caffeined writes "I think almost every geek's heart must skip a beat when they hear about giant squids (think "Jules Verne"). It appears the two Japanese researchers have managed (for the first time) to get actual footage of a live giant squid in action. It was "only" 26 feet long (a little more than 8m) which is big enough for me." Update: Pictures and no registration required at National Geographic.
How long? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:How long? (Score:5, Interesting)
Titanic Struggle (Score:5, Interesting)
I've read that during WWII giant squid would attack red life boats filled with sailors from sunk ships. Apparently the red colour attracts them.
By all accounts they are extremely aggresive, suggesting they don't see themselves as prey and know no predators.
I think I'll keep my exposure to them second hand.
Re:How long? (Score:3, Interesting)
Without lungs to collapse is the pressure really an issue? I thought the only thing from a fish's point of view (besides the light level) that changes with pressure was the viscosity.
Re:It's really too bad... (Score:2, Interesting)
Chances might not be great now, but when it was a "myth" they were non-existant. Noone in his right mind is going to make sacrifices to protect the existance of a species that has not been proven to exist. At least we know for a fact these buggers are still alive. That's worth whatever sacrifice to that species that the photos necessitated.
Re:Titanic Struggle (Score:3, Interesting)
As for them attacking life boats, that's ridiculous. If they were that easy to attract we would have photographed and captured them by now.
Thirdly, giant squid do have natural predators, the aforementioned sperm whales and (according to Wikipedia) the pacific sleeper shark.
They are nasty beasts, though. Take a look at their rotating beaks sometime, or read up on them at the Wikipedia article [wikipedia.org].
Now that you mention sperm whales.. (Score:5, Interesting)
There was an episode on Discovery's Animal Face-off [discovery.com] about a Giant Squid versus a Sperm Whale: The winner was the sperm whale, which stunned the squid with its sonic emitter, and then ate it whole. Of course, before this, the whale had to swim at a very high speed to get rid of the squid's clawed tentacles (this is why some sperm whales have scars on their heads, because you can't just take off a squid's tentacle, you have to rip it off - ouch).
It was an exciting and interesting episode
Re:How long? (Score:2, Interesting)
Living in gas versus liquid is different than living in gas versus a vaccuum.
The grandparent already pointed out that lungs make a difference. Humans' lungs would implode underwater, and explode in space. However, liquid cannot be compressed (pressure can change, but volume doesn't change). Since squids have no internal gasses (hence, no lungs) to compress or exapand, water pressure won't make a difference.
Re:Titanic Struggle (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Skip a beat, eh? (Score:2, Interesting)
WARNING... LINK TO SEXUALLY EXPLICIT MATERIAL!!!
http://www.erosblog.com/archives/00000386.htm [erosblog.com]
I hope this isn't going against some decency thing here on slashdot...
Re:Pictures (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:WOW. (Score:5, Interesting)
It only takes one, and the squid is dead. That one happens to be sperm whales, maybe other giant squid as well. Possibly even some other large predators we have never found as of yet (or think are extinct).
Re:How long? (Score:3, Interesting)
did you know... (Score:4, Interesting)
It would be tough but possible. (Score:3, Interesting)
Start off with a hollow tube. I would suggest a tube about 60' in length (giant squid grow up to 40', and you have to allow time for this to work) and about 10' in diameter. Possibly a bit more. The tube walls need to be somewhere between 10'-20' in thickness and be good-quality steel. Each end needs to have a door that can close and be 100% watertight. Both the door and locking mechanism have to survive pressures of around 400 atmospheres or more. There needs to be a motion detector at each end. If either motion detector registers sustained motion for more than some given length of time, both doors shut the moment motion is no longer detected. (ie: whatever is moving is now fully inside.) You also need to set it that once the doors close, bags on either side are forcibly inflated, so the tube rises to the surface. Once it hits the surface, a radio signals where the tube is.
It's a simple system, the pressure is constant on the inside (so the squid won't be affected) and you could scatter any number of these at the required depth. You then just sit back and wait. Eventually, a squid will be caught. You then tow the tube to the aquarium and lower it into a tank. You then pressurise the tank to 400 atmospheres and open the tube.
(Pressure increases by 1 atmosphere about every 25 feet, so the pressures at 10,000 feet - where Giant Squid roam - will be 400 atmospheres. In practice it may be a little more or a little less, but if you aim for the theoretical pressure, the squid should do just fine.)
This would be implementable by any aquarium (with money) right now. They could have a giant squid within a few months at most, if the tube is baited the way the hooks by these researchers were. There are a few difficulties, though. You'd need 300' thick windows to withstand the pressure. Yes, that's feet. The second problem is that it would be almost impossible to put food into the tank. The third problem is that it would cost a LOT of money to build even one tube, and you'd likely lose most of those you drop into the ocean.
(I'm ignoring the practical difficulties in building a containment system large enough for the squid not to be injured by a high speed impact against the doors when they close, or by impact with the side walls when it tries to turn around.)
Kraken (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:How long? (Score:2, Interesting)
How long before the Japanese start capturing them for "scientific" purposes? You know, like they do with whales?
Ok, you can mod me flaimbait now...
Re:How long? (Score:5, Interesting)
Arguably, one could make a space suit that was simply a skin tight layer + helmet. The problem with that would be that it would have to be *perfectly* skin tight. I.e. Any gas between the suit and you, and you will be VERY uncomfortable, as the gas makes the suit expand like a balloon. Assuming that was worked out, it would have of number advantages over conventional space suits. The joints would be MUCH more flexible, and less complex, as they wouldn't require complicated pressure equalization systems to allow the joints to move.
Hey, I just thought out how to get around the skintight issue. Cover the human in vaseline, or some other viscous nonvolatile (which means the vaseline wouldn't work very long, depending how much was evaporating through the suit) fluid, to fill in all the empty spaces left by the suit!
So you get a system that is = person + skin tight body suit + nonvolatile fluid + bubble helmet + Air supply. I'm certain it would work, just not sure for how long. The limiting factor is how fast you lose volatiles, but it could easily be made to work as long as the longest spacewalks the US has ever attempted, and would be a hell of a lot lighter, simpler, and cheaper.
An even bigger species than the Giant Squid... (Score:5, Interesting)
Ummm, no, not EVERY time... (Score:4, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:How long? (Score:5, Interesting)
Divers going below about 90 feet (30 metres) breathing air suffer nitrogen narcosis as dissolved nitrogen in the nerves cause an effect akin to drunkenness or partial anaesthesia.
Because the human breathing response is driven by the absolute partial pressure of carbon dioxide in the bloodstream, not its ratio to oxygen, deep diving means breathing much more air than is needed simply to flush out the apparent elevated level of co2 in the blood - the physiology is tricked by the pressure. Anyone practising emergency surfacing from a deep dive is astonished that they don't need to breath as they rise - you continuously exhale as the gas in the lungs expands (I was taught to sing on the way up) and the breathing response isn't triggered because the detected co2 level keeps falling.
Now this may not affect squid much, it's hard to believe that there are no pressure effects on the chemistry underpinning their biology.
Re:How long? (Score:5, Interesting)
That's not the primary problem. The primary problem is that the human brain needs a minimum level of oxygen to operate; that oxygen can only be provided by the respitory system at a rate directly proportional to the o2 pressure in the respirated environment(or "partial pressure" in mixed gas environments, like earth at sealevel). If you decrease pressure, you must likewise increase o2 or risk cognitive failure and rapid blackout (with little-to-no warning either). Now, as with all biology, individuals differ widely, but
That means that any environmental suit must maintain the same approximate force upon the wearer as exerted by the wearer's respiration gas pressure. Likewise, in order to prevent circulatory damage, the force needs to be exerted pretty evenly across the entire body. So, in effect, you're talking about a suit that can "squeeze" the wearer evenly at a minimum of three or so lbs/sq inch. Assuming such could be designed, how do you propose one would don such an outfit in a pressurised environment? I don't care how great your lubricant of choice is, I can't imagine someone getting into one of these things in the first place without great physical harm occuring.
Re:How long? (Score:5, Interesting)
Nope. In the void there is no convection -- and that's how you lose most heat. In space you only lose it through thermal radiation.
Re:WOW. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:How long? (Score:5, Interesting)
Thanks for the link.
Re:How long? (Score:3, Interesting)
My god, is "incurious" the same as "funny"?? (Score:3, Interesting)
Ho ho. Imagine a 60-foot-long alien intelligence that's been living in the earth's oceans for millennia -- the source of countless myths and legends -- that escaped direct observation by modern science except in the form of dead specimens.
Cephalopods are cool stuff. Their nerve fibers are unbelievably thick -- used for all sorts of medical research, because you can actually see their axons with the naked eye in some species -- and fast. They don't have true brains, just big accretions of these ultra-thick nerve fibers, but they display many of the classic signs of intelligence. For example, octopuses are very adept problem solvers when hunting, and squid of lots of different species are astonishingly good at using changing skin coloration for camoflage and, seemingly, for communication.
Cool animals. Super big example that nobody's been able to find. It's worth being curious -- worth lots more than posing as too cool to be interested...
Re:How long? (Score:3, Interesting)