We've frequently heard of human and dinosaur graveyards, but a graveyard for marine creatures at the bottom of the ocean? That's rare, and one has to be extremely lucky to come across one.
This new graveyard marks the first time scientists have ever captured images of a dead whale shark and three dead rays laying at the bottom of the ocean. In the past, scientists have only documented nine vertebrate carcasses, and that's in a span of 50 years.
Creatures in the sea naturally fall to the bottom of the ocean when they kick the bucket. This important event allows for seafloor dwelling creatures such as snails and crabs to feed. However, when it comes down to the sunken carcass of a dead whale, this is rarely observed in the scientific community.
The new footage found of the whale shark and three rays were captured in the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of Angola in West Africa. They were not captured by divers, but by a remote operate vehicle (Isis) that was conducting an underwater survey for the oil company.
"We were just finishing a dive with the U.K.'s remotely operated vehicle, Isis, when we glimpsed a row of pale-coloured blocks in the distance, which turned out to be whale vertebrae on the seabed," says researcher Jon Copley, of the University of Southampton in England.
When Isis came across the carcasses, all that was left of the whale shark was its flesh head, its fin and part of the creature's spine. On the matter of the rays, they were reduced to their skeleton with little fishes feeding on the leftovers.
Compared to other discoveries in the past, this "fish fall" had little carcasses on the sea floor. As per the scientists, this has a lot to do with the fact that some creatures, such as sharks and rays, have less nutrients and fat in their bodies, so they tend to decompose quickly. This is not the case for whales, since their body is filled with fat and other key nutrients. In fact, the carcass of a whale decomposes so slowly that it could last at the bottom of the sea floor for decades.
