Giant Squid Attacks Boat
Comments: 31
Not an everyday occurence. No photographs, unfortunately. From the Sydney Morning Herald:
A French yacht taking part in the Jules Verne round-the-world sailing trophy has been attacked by a giant squid in the mid-Atlantic, its skipper announced by radio link.
Veteran yachtsman Oliver de Kersauson, at the helm of the trimaran Geronimo, said the boat was hit by strange vibrations on Sunday, so he sent a crew member below deck to try to identify what was wrong.
“Suddenly he saw something moving,” de Kersauson said. “It was tentacles.
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Posted to Oh, the Humanity • 2003.01.17 (Fri) • 11:14
Comments
Posted by pixelkitty 2003.01.17, 13:37
it was only a baby one too, by the size estimate.
too bad there were no pics!
Posted by Ian 2003.01.17, 15:57
And they’re getting bigger too. Like hot cocoa mix, Just add hot water.
Posted by jh 2003.01.17, 16:29
Ian — Thanks for the link.
Scientists say that they have found that a 1 per cent increase in water temperature causes juvenile squid to double in size.
Sweet Jesus! That’s astonishing.
Posted by chas 2003.01.17, 23:48
Does anyone else think this is a spoof: a GIANT SQUID, the JULES VERNE round-the-world trophy? I read this and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea comes immediately to mind.
Posted by ed 2003.01.18, 01:55
My stepdad was in the navy and a while back i was talking about giant quid to him and he told me a story about when he was at sea the crew were all called to the deck. Alongside the ship was a whale with a giant squid on its head with its tentacles wrapped round it. One of his navy pals confirmed it.
whale’s are their favourite food. I read that we normally only see them because they chase whales and sometimes that chase goes through a warm current. Heat makes squid bouyant so they end up coming to the surface. apparently.
chas> yup, sounds fishy, excuse the pun, now you mention it. but the jules-verne is a proper event and it’s contestants are small vessels, no propellers and in the sea. it would be easier to notice an attack on one of those boats than any others plus they would probably look more attractive to squid.
Posted by mr.x 2003.01.18, 02:09
I asked my dad, who has a friend, who has a sail boat, and he said that one time at sail boat camp, they heard that if you eat whale or squid, or even sit in warm currents you become sterile and stupid, and loose races because you are totally lost on the ocean.
Posted by jh 2003.01.18, 12:46
Chas — You almost made me spit coffee all over my monitor. Laughing out loud indeed. My bullshit filters were turned off most of the day yesterday for some reason and I didn’t pick up on this at all.
Ed — I always thought it was the whales that went after the squid, who then naturally put up a good fight because wouldn’t you if a whale tried to eat you?
Are these giant squid likely to attack? Or would it be more a case of self-defense? I can imagine a squid lolling about near the surface, perhaps slightly disoriented from being so high up in the ocean (they usually stay pretty deep, right?) and then being struck by a yacht and getting a bit angry and then lashing out with a tentacle or two. I know I would (it pretty much describes me in the morning before the coffee kicks in).
Posted by ed 2003.01.21, 00:08
jh - nah, whales aren’t carnivores (except killer whales, but then i don’t think they’re whales)
as far as them attacking, i think boats might look like certain prey maybe … i saw this trashy doc on sharks which was reeling out the usual stuff about sharks only attacking humans cause we act like injured fish in the water but they then said that most often it’s because they’re intruiged by us and that they can’t investigate anything with hands like we can so they do the only thing they know how, eat it. the way the guy said it had me in tears for ages.
Posted by Mr. X 2003.03.02, 13:09
squid don’t attack boats. Most likely, it was sick, or messed up in some way, and those guys just bumped into it. squids don’t attack whales either, it’s the other way around. Ed, you’re half right, whales eat mostly plankton (although they swallow fishes at the same time, they don’t pick them out of the tones and tones of water they filter… ;) but giant squids are hunted specifically by Sperm Whales (the one in Moby Dick, but not white) which are the only one that can go (and stay for a while) deep enough to track them down. btw, they’re called sperm whale ‘cause the whale killers back then thought the amount of oil (called spermaceti) they have in their head was sperm. Incidentally, this oil and the way it reacts to water temperature and density is the reason why they can stay so long and so deep (down to 10,000 feet!) under water (don’t remember the exact scientific explanation but I’m not sure anyone cares anyways… ;). And Killer Whales are whales, hence the name ;)
Posted by Hicks5_0 2003.05.24, 04:25
I am doing a report on Giant squid so any info you have on them would be useful. E-mail jwa@centurytel.net
Posted by mike dickless 2003.05.26, 08:27
what the fuck 2 cent? hun what those it mean ?fuck!!! ok giant squids live in whales yup uhh yes in whales yup ok
Posted by chonas009 2003.08.30, 12:03
right well 1) giant squid have been known to attack baby right and sperm whales (eye witness accounts), and sharks (stomach content analysis. 2) squid come to the surface if they are sick, dying, or wounded. The rise in temperature causes them to die. Also, squid at the surface occur mainly at night because the water is much cooler, and they are used to the darkness. 3) If you do any research at all on squid you would find that they live very deep in the water except for their extreme young who live at the surface and of whom 16 were captured.
Posted by zac 2003.10.01, 15:15
hey whats up im really really interested in giant squids so if you have any additional info for me it’d be great and i’d really appreciate it. thanks. darkstorm89@hotmail.com <<< email me.
Posted by grant 2003.11.19, 21:46
hi i am a follower on giant squid and i would apreciate if you would put some pics on your sites thanks
grant
thank you and lease send one back
Posted by Tyler 2004.03.13, 02:24
About that squid doubling in size thing…
They weren’t referring to giant squid as in the monstrous creature who kills sperm whales, they were referring to giant squids as in bigger then normal squids.
I seriously doubt that Giant sqiuds are doubling in size just like that. That could make them 200-340 feet long.
Posted by Adrian 2004.03.20, 09:14
Holy Crap!
I’ve never seen so much misinformation bounced back and forth in one place! (With the exception of Mr. X, who seems to have, unlike the rest of the group here, read a book or two in his lifetime.) Have fun guys.
Posted by Bass 2004.03.20, 15:16
So Ed’s step dad saw a giant one pound note alongside his ship? Whoabejesus! The Bank of England would sure like to harpoon that sucker.
Posted by Ryan 2004.03.24, 09:56
Mr. X is retarded. Killer whales are not whales, they are dolphins.
Posted by bojsey 2004.04.21, 01:20
Orcas are the largest member of the dolphin family, Delphinidae. Males grow to a maximum length of about 32ft (9.8m) and weight of 10 - 11 tons (9 - 10,000 kg) Females are smaller and grow to a maximum length of about 28ft ( 8.5m ), weighing as much as 7 -8 tons (6,500 to 7,500 kg). Calves at birth are about 8ft (2.4m) long and weigh about 400lbs (180 kg).
Posted by anon 2004.10.13, 23:33
dont you guys have any thing better to do besides talk about sguid ,fucking losers
Posted by jh 2004.10.15, 12:21
I’ve said this time and time again, but if you’re going to write a “fuck you” post, you absolutely must punctuate it correctly or else you look like a maroon, as Bugs Bunny used to say.
Posted by Tim Shepard 2005.09.29, 02:48
I’m sorry, but this is too much BS. This story was obviously a hoax and I can’t believe so many people fell for it. Look at the article. The boat was in the “Jules Verne around the world trophy”, what do most people think of when they think of Jules Verne, right, the Giant Squid from 20,000 Leagues, the movie.
The odds against this being true are roughly the odds of someone’s boat being attacked by a giant squid on any one trip (Let’s say 100,000 to 1 against at the very least, multiplied by the odds of any one boat being in the “Jules Verne around the world trophy” (Over 10,000,000 to 1 I’m sure) which makes the odds of this story being true about 1trillion to 1 against. Not good odds.
Posted by Frank 2005.12.15, 05:26
I’ve seen one. In my submarine, then it had a fight with a Sperm Whale who was all scarred up.
Posted by jim 2006.01.30, 11:54
our local news is saying they have video footage of the attack. they showed a few second clip on the commercial. it hasn’t been on yet.
Posted by Graeme 2006.03.05, 08:29
I’m guessing it wasn’t an Architeuthis (Giant Squid), but it might be a Mesonychoteuthis Hamiltoni (Colossal Squid). Mesonychoteuthis Hamiltoni is the Architeuthis’s larger cousin.
Posted by Andrew 2006.04.06, 00:08
I am doing a report on the Architeuthis dux ( giant squid) There has been alot of scientific research done on these creatures they are rarely at the surface of the ocean if they are they are usually near death. In the 1870’s over 20 carcuses of these giant squid were found on the coast of Newfoundland. A Rev. Moses Harvey collect and preserved these samples and gave them to famed cephalodpod expert Addison E Verril professor of Zoology and curator in zoology at the Yale PEabody Museum. These squid are not predetors of whales however some attacks have been known to happen and smaller whales have been found in the digestive system of these squid. There have been sightings of these ginat squid dating back to the 1500’s when explorer Sir Humphery Gilbert sailed the waters of Newfoundland and claimed St. JOhns for England! There is a lot of information available on these jsut search Newfoundland Sea Monsters!
Posted by delaney 2006.06.29, 10:13
i love squid i may only be 10 but their amazing! i want to learn about squid attacks!
Posted by Luke 2006.10.12, 02:15
I have been looking up on the net and I agree with Mr.X the squid must have been dying or wounded and with its tentacles flailing around in pain it must have looked like it was trying to attack the boat. Plus the people on the boat exxagerated the story to get some free publicity. So in the end I feel sorry for the poor squid.
Posted by Tracy B Hopkins 2007.02.20, 02:31
I felt I was rather knowledgeable about arkatoothless but in reading the last several posts I feel ignorant. A sperm whale is now a dolphin….. I can’t believe how litle I know. Actually I cant believe how fast people are willing to spread wrong info, with such exooberants too.
Posted by mARK hOPKINS 2007.02.20, 02:33
I felt I was rather knowledgeable about arkatoothless but in reading the last several posts I feel ignorant. A sperm whale is now a dolphin….. I can’t believe how litle I know. Actually I cant believe how fast people are willing to spread wrong info, with such exooberants too.
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