When a fisherman in Norway reeled in a strange, alien-looking creature from the water, he was taken aback. The weird beast had enormous, bulbous eyes that gave it the appearance of something absolutely alien.
Oscar Lundahl with his catch
Oscar Lundahl, 19, almost “jumped out of his fishing boat” when he drew the bizarre creature into his boat, according to The Sun. The fish’s huge eyes and small body were seen in photos.
Lundahl, a Nordic Sea Angling fishing guide, was apparently fishing for blue halibut off the coast of Norway’s Andoya island when he made the catch. At the time, he was fishing 2,600 feet below the surface.
He told The Sun, “We were looking for blue halibut, which is a rare species, about 5 miles offshore. I had four hooks on one line and felt something quite big on the end of it. It took me about 30 minutes to reel it in because it was over 2,600 feet deep.”
The strange-looking fish wasn’t his only catch of the day. He said, “There were two halibut on two of the hooks and I was really happy about that and then I saw there was something else. It was pretty amazing. I have never seen anything like it before. It just looked weird, a bit dinosaur-like. I didn’t know what it was but my colleague did.”
According to The Sun, the fish was a ratfish, a 300 million-year-old relative of sharks. They live in deep water and are said to be extremely tough to catch.
Lundahl claims that due to the extreme change in pressure, the ratfish didn’t survive the experience. Not wanting to waste it, Lundahl claimed that he took the fish home and fried it up. Despite its ugly appearance, “it was really tasty,” he told The Sun. “It is a bit like cod but tastier.”
The strange fish had large, bulbous eyes that made it look like something truly out of this world. Oscar Lundahl