Venturing out onto the open ocean can result in some pretty fantastic experiences. The environment below the surface of the water is full of amazing creatures and plenty of mystery. You never really know what you’ll come across.
When Mark Watkins headed out for a fishing trip off the coast of Western Australia, he’d hoped to come home with dinner. Instead, he came home with one heck of a story.
That’s because, as he and his father drove their boat through the choppy morning waves, they happened upon an amazingly bizarre sight. At first they thought it was a boat, then, a hot air balloon. The truth, however, was even crazier.
When they first spotted a large sphere-like object floating above the waves, Mark Watkins and his father thought it was an overturned boat. As they got closer, they thought perhaps it was a hot air balloon. Then they realized the truth.
In reality, it was an enormous — and very dead — humpback whale, swollen from gas. After a whale as big as this one dies, the decomposition of the internal organs cause a large amount of gaseous buildup. Whales can even explode from the pressure if it gets high enough!
In all his years on the sea, Mark had never seen anything like it! It’s rare enough to see a living whale while you’re out fishing, but to see the gigantic carcass of one floating like a buoy in the ocean was something he’d never forget!
