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e

Food

California Oil Spill Turns Out to Be a Freakishly Massive Amount of Fish

By Rain Noe - July 11, 2014

Earlier this week in La Jolla, California, what appeared to be a massive oil spill in the water began creeping towards the beach. However, closer inspection revealed that the inky cloud was not a batch of Exxon-Mobil's finest at all, but an enormous school of fish. Specifically, anchovies.

Anchovies can typically be found in the world's major oceans and on pizzas, where they are prized for their ability to completely ruin the flavor. But prior to fulfilling their pizza-sabotaging destinies, schools of anchovies typically keep their distance from the shore. Upon investigating, scientists from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography "said it is unclear why the unusually large school moved into shallow waters off the coast," which maybe defeats the purpose of having institutions of oceanography.

"It is rare to see so many anchovy abutting the surf zone," one SIO professor told CNN. He also estimated the size of this batch to be anywhere from one million to 100 million, pointing to a possible prior career as a contractor.

An anchovy taking a break. Or maybe it's dead. I don't know, I'm not an oceanographer

An anchovy taking a break. Or maybe it's dead. I don't know, I'm not an oceanographer

In the following video, a couple of SIO grad students swim towards the fish because they have never seen the movies Piranha, Piranha II: The Spawning and Piranha 3D. And despite the fact that neither Elisabeth Shue nor Jerry O'Connell appear in the underwater GoPro footage that starts halfway in, it's pretty damn neat to see.

Rain Noe

Rain Noe is a writer and industrial designer based in New York City.

9 Comments

SD Surfer

4 years ago

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Love the wittiness! Thank you for brightening my day.
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pigeon mat

4 years ago

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I can think of two reasons:
- changes in the ocean itself: global warming causing acidification and/or temperature changes and/or ecosystems to collapse

- seismic blasts from oil-exploration driving animals (the ones that are not close enough to be killed) away from their natural habitat

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Kyle

4 years ago

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I had the same thoughts as everyone who has commented before me. When I clicked on comments and saw there were already (6), I knew they were going to be praising the wit and humor.
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Gate

4 years ago

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Ahaha, I had a good laugh reading this, thank you!
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Lukas

4 years ago

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I believe you outdid yourself this time, hipstomp. A piece (or two) of wit in every paragraph. It was a good read.
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jomy

4 years ago

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Amazing story, even better copywriting.
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Daniel

4 years ago

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Such a pleasant surprise to find witty humor in a seemingly ordinary blog post. Awesome!
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Clara

4 years ago

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^^^ I agree!
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Austin

4 years ago

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I'm just here to say that:

"He also estimated the size of this batch to be anywhere from one million to 100 million, pointing to a possible prior career as a contractor."

and

"In the following video, a couple of SIO grad students swim towards the fish because they have never seen the movies Piranha, Piranha II: The Spawning and Piranha 3D."

are comedy gold to me.
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