Ghostly ‘Dumbo’ octopus is caught on digital camera greater than 5,500ft underwater off the coast of Hawaii

Halloween appears to have come early deep beneath the waves as researchers have found a uncommon ‘ghostly’ octopus.

A staff of ocean explorers noticed the uncommon ‘Dumbo’ Octopus 5,518ft (1,682 metres) beneath the floor, off the coast of Hawaii.

The crew of the Hercules distant operated car may be heard exclaiming because the beautiful creature drifts into view.

‘Oh wow!’ stated one researcher, whereas one other joked that the octopus had ‘flappy, flappy ears.’

The Dumbo Octopus will get its identify from a putting resemblance to the 1941 cartoon character, Dumbo the elephant, with its two massive ear-like fins protruding above its eyes.

Halloween appears to have come early deep beneath the waves as researchers have found a uncommon ‘ghostly’ octopus

Within the video captured by the Ocean Exploration Belief, the octopus may be seen flapping its ‘ears’ to propel itself by way of the water.

Because the footage exhibits, Dumbo Octopuses are additionally neutrally buoyant, permitting them to float serenely by way of the pitch black of the deep seas.

Whereas this creature might sound weird to some, many commenters on social media discovered the mild animal to be extra cute than creepy.

‘Unimaginable!’, wrote one excited commenter, including that they wished ‘an enormous plushie of this lovely fella!’

‘I might watch this octopus all day, what a phenomenal being’ one other stated, whereas one viewer added that the octopus was ‘formed like a good friend’.

Measuring round 2ft lengthy, the specimen on movie is kind of massive for a species usually not more than 8 to 12 inches in size.

Nevertheless, that is solely a small fry in comparison with the most important Dumbo Octopus ever discovered, which got here in at 5ft 10 inches lengthy and weighing virtually 6kg.

The deepest diving of all octopuses, residing at depths between 1,000 and seven,000m, the Dumbo Octopus is uncommon and uniquely tailored to the intense situations of life on the backside of the ocean.

Utilizing their robust fins and steering with their eight webbed limbs, these fascinating creatures can survive consuming no matter snails and worms they discover on the ocean flooring.

With inside cartilage supporting their limbs, they’re additionally properly tailored to the immense pressures discovered at these depths.

At 1,500m beneath the waves the stress is nearly 150x better than on land, which means most sea animals merely can’t survive.

The crew of the Hercules distant operated car may be heard exclaiming because the beautiful creature drifts into view

Within the video captured by the Ocean Exploration Belief, the octopus may be seen flapping its ‘ears’ to propel itself by way of the water

The deepest recorded sighting of a Dumbo Octopus was at over 23,000ft (7km) within the Java trench – that is over 20 instances the peak of the Shard in London.

With animal life scattered far throughout the huge oceans, Dumbo Octopuses additionally should be ready to go lengthy durations of time with out seeing different octopuses, which makes discovering a possible mate fairly the problem.

To get round these difficulties, feminine Dumbos consistently have eggs at totally different phases of improvement like vehicles going by way of a manufacturing line to allow them to be able to mate and lay eggs each time the chance arises.

Scientists additionally consider that male Dumbo Octopuses retailer sperm in a particular projection in one among their arms which they’ll hand over to a feminine to be saved till it is a good time to put eggs.

‘Dumbo Octopus’ truly refers to a household of 17 various kinds of octopus, but there could also be extra species of Dumbo Octopus nonetheless to be found.

Solely final 12 months a staff of German scientists makes use of MRI scans and DNA testing to determine a brand new species of Dumbo Octopus by no means earlier than described by science.

At such excessive depths beforehand undiscovered species are frequent so there are lots weirder and spooky discoveries but to be made.