Divers have encountered a shockingly large jellyfish in the waters off of Britain.
Biologist and broadcaster Lizzie Daly was diving in the Atlantic Ocean near Cornwall with cameraman Dan Abbott when they found a barrel jellyfish that appears to be larger than Daly. The pair shared photos and video on Instagram.
The team was exploring the sea as part of Wild Ocean Week, a fundraising campaign for the Marine Conservation Society of the United Kingdom, reports The Washington Post.
“My first reaction was that I’ve never seen a jellyfish that size in my life,” Abbott told The Post.
“We weren’t expecting anything,” Daly told The Post. “It was an absolute delight to get that experience.”
Barrel jellyfish are just a millimeter in length when born, Cheryl Ames told The Post. Ames is research collaborator with the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and was not involved with Saturday’s dive.
Ames told The Post the creatures grow large in the wild and live off the coast of the United Kingdom as well as in the Mediterranean.
Read more of the story at The Washington Post.
