Man drops camera to bottom of the sea and 'records first ever footage of creature'
A man took it upon himself to drop a special camera to the bottom of the Bali Sea, with the experiment discovering something intriguing.
He's not the first to come up with the concept, with many in the past being curious enough to drop a GoPro or similar cameras in the ocean to see what lurks beneath the surface.
YouTuber Barny Dillarstone decided to travel to Nusa Penida, an Indonesian island near Bali, explaining that it is known as 'Black Magic Island.
He claimed that the area has 'a history of demons and sorcery', while being 'surrounded by an angry ocean that can turn in a second'.
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Explaining that he learned to dive in this area, he also revealed that the first few times he dropped remote cameras in the sea were in this area, as Barny was desperate to find 'a species new to science'.
Now though, he said that while he was 'stupid' enough to drop a camera hundreds of feet, he has no regrets as he 'managed to record the first ever footage of at least two large, deep water species swimming around in the wild', among other things.
Using the new underwater action camera from Insta360, the Ace Pro 2, he managed to capture two deep sea species roaming around.
First up on camera was the spurdog, a species of shark which is also known as a dogfish.
They are identified through their smooth dorsal fin spines, similar sized teeth, large eyes, and the presence of a spine in the front of each dorsal fin.
Unlike land sharks such as great whites, their teeth aren't built for 'slicing', said the content creator, as they instead tend to 'grab and twist' their prey.
He explained: "This shark has a slender body, short snout, very tall, erect dorsal fins with pale tips and long dorsal spines, and a caudal or tail fin with a broad white margin and no dark patches."
The predator could be seen trying to munch the bait off the pipe attached to the camera, almost 200m below the surface.
"Their enormous eyes suck in so much of it that when illuminated, they likely just see a big glowing object, rather than details that might trigger caution," Barny added.
He noted that there were several spurdogs swimming around but he couldn't tell exactly how many were around the camera.
Later on in the video, Barny explained: "Throughout this entire drop, a large, flattened animal kept appearing, but it didn't look like anything I'd seen before. It's a ray, of course, and the head and snout looked like that of shallower water eagle rays."
He noted its flat brown purple colour while being very deep, while observing that the ray swam into the frame.
"Like the Western highfin spurdog sighting, this discovery is particularly exciting because it's likely that this is the first footage of this species alive in the wild," the YouTuber noted.
Barny explained that the creature had venomous barbs lining her tail, with the species also being 'capable of rapid bursts of speed'.
He added that the most interesting creatures he has found in the ocean appears at night, claiming that 'the small sharks we recorded in the day are but a small snack for the predators that really dominate'.
Joshua Nair