Divers spot rare gigantic oarfish with shark bites off Taiwan coast

According to the divers, the fish measured around 6-and-a-half feet long. (Representative Image)

In a chance incident, a group of divers encountered a giant oarfish with mysterious holes in its body. The rare fish which is believed to be a sign of impending earthquakes was seen off Taiwan and a video of the same has spread like wildfire on the internet.

The now-viral video was shared on Instagram by a page called Wealth. In the clip, stunned divers can be seen circling around the huge shiny silver fish off the coast of Ruifang. At one point, one of the divers even reached out to touch the miracle which has a deep-sea habitat.

According to the divers, the fish measured around 6-and-a-half feet long, which is big but doesn’t even compare to their maximum size which is 36 feet. It is considered the longest bony fish alive in modern times by the Guinness Book of World Records.

However, the spotting of the rare fish was not good sign for it as per the divers. “It must have been dying, so it swam into shallower waters,” diving instructor Wang Cheng-Ru told Jam Press.

The mysterious holes that were found on the fish’s body were believed to be shark bites, possibly the work of a cookiecutter shark, according to experts.

The spotting of an oarfish is also rumoured to be a sign of earthquakes. The denizen is often found between 656 and 3,200 feet below the ocean’s surface and according to a superstition in Japanese mythology, the fish rises to the surface ahead of an impending earthquake.

This rumour started to fly during the 2011 Fukushima earthquake and tsunami when dozens of oarfish washed ashore in the two years preceding the catastrophe, according to the New York Post.