Back in 2017, a team of explorers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) were poking around at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean in the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument. It’s not unusual for them to be doing that — they are deep sea researchers, after all — but what they found in a particular patch of ocean sure was. Unusual enough that they dubbed it the “Forest of the Weird.”
This strange little part of the sea was found on the side of a submerged volcano. It’s full of weird corals and glass sponges, shaped a little differently than usual, all oriented directly into the current. Bottlebrushes and Narella corals with pink brittlestars climbing up their branches, glass sponges on stalks, and a variety of other undersea oddities give the Forest of the Weird a decidedly Dr. Seuss-ian feel.
The researchers, who were watching through screens as a remotely operated vehicle called Deep Discoverer recorded, were astounded by what they saw. “Every time we do these dives,” one of the researchers can be heard saying, “I think to myself, ‘This is the type of experience someone would have if they found life on another planet.'”
The dive was part of an expedition called the 2017 Laulima O Ka Moana: Exploring Deep Monument Waters Around Johnston Atoll. From July 7 to August 2, 2017, researchers aboard the NOAA ship Okeanos Explorer collected “critical baseline information about unknown and poorly known deepwater areas in the Johnston Atoll Unit of the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument.”
And if the Forest of the Weird is the baseline… well, it’s just more proof that the bottom of the ocean is an exceedingly interesting place.
Video courtesy of NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research, 2017 Laulima O Ka Moana.
