{"id":553810,"date":"2026-06-25T17:23:59","date_gmt":"2026-06-25T17:23:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/553810\/"},"modified":"2026-06-25T17:23:59","modified_gmt":"2026-06-25T17:23:59","slug":"rare-goblin-shark-spotted-alive-in-its-natural-habitat-for-the-first-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/553810\/","title":{"rendered":"Rare Goblin Shark Spotted Alive in Its Natural Habitat for the First Time"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Goblin<\/a>Goblin shark near Tonga Trench (2024). Credit: Minderoo-University of Western Australia Deep-Sea Research Center and Inkfish.<\/p>\n

Scientists have reported the first-ever live observations of the elusive goblin shark in its natural deep-sea habitat, capturing footage at two remote locations in the Central Pacific.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Few sharks are as strange\u2014or as elusive\u2014as the goblin shark. With its elongated snout, protrusible jaws, and ancient lineage stretching back nearly 125 million years, the deep-sea predator has long fascinated scientists, yet no one had ever documented it alive in its natural habitat.<\/p>\n

Now, a University of Hawai\u2018i at M\u0101noa<\/a>-led team of oceanographers has reported the first published live sightings of the rare goblin shark (Mitsukurina owstoni) in the deep ocean. The study, published in the Journal of Fish Biology, describes two encounters in the Central Pacific, one near a seamount off Jarvis Island and another along the slope of the Tonga Trench.<\/p>\n

Until now, live goblin sharks had only been filmed or observed after being caught on fishing lines and hauled to the surface, where they typically died soon afterward. The new observations not only provide an unprecedented look at the species in its natural environment but also significantly expand its known geographic and depth ranges.<\/p>\n

\"GoblinGoblin shark near Jarvis Island (2019). Credit: Ocean Exploration Trust, Nautilus Live.<\/p>\n

\u201cSeeing the most iconic of all the deep-sea sharks alive and looking healthy in its natural habitat is a unique honour,\u201d said Aaron Judah, lead author of the paper and doctoral candidate working in the Deep-Sea Fish Ecology Lab and Deep-Sea Animal Research Center (DARC) in the Department of Oceanography at the UH M\u0101noa School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology. \u201cI was also very surprised about how deep this species was found. The observation from the slope of the Tonga Trench is nearly 700 meters deeper than this species was known to live.\u201d<\/p>\n

Central Pacific Discovery Expands Known Range<\/p>\n

Judah noted that the Tonga Trench sighting also sets a new depth record for all Lamniformes, the order of mackerel sharks that includes white sharks, basking sharks, and mako sharks. Before these findings, goblin sharks were known only from limited areas off the western U.S., Australia, and Japan in the Pacific Ocean, along with narrow regions of the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. Because both new sightings occurred in the Central Pacific, they significantly broaden the species\u2019 known range.<\/p>\n

Goblin shark near Jarvis Island (2019). Credit: Ocean Exploration Trust, Nautilus Live.<\/p>\n

In 2025, Judah learned from colleagues at DARC that a possible goblin shark had been seen during a 2019 Ocean Exploration Trust<\/a> expedition aboard the E\/V Nautilus. That expedition studied deep-sea ecosystems near Kingman Reef, Palmyra Atoll, and Jarvis Island in the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was shocked to hear this because this species was not to be known to be in the Central Pacific,\u201d said Judah.<\/p>\n

During that cruise, the remotely operated vehicle Hercules recorded video with a camera system. The footage was publicly archived and later annotated by DARC colleagues at UH M\u0101noa. After reviewing the archive, Judah confirmed that the team had recorded a goblin shark during a livestreamed dive at an unnamed seamount northwest of Jarvis Island.<\/p>\n

Tonga Trench Encounter Reveals Record-Breaking Depths<\/p>\n

The second sighting came from a 2024 expedition to the Tonga Trench aboard the R\/V Dagon. The work was part of the Inkfish Open Ocean Expedition, led by scientists from the Minderoo-UWA Deep-Sea Research Center. During the expedition, a baited camera on a bottom lander captured footage of a goblin shark in its natural habitat.<\/p>\n

\"AaronAaron Judah combed through archived footage to confirm a goblin shark was observed in its natural habitat on a cruise in 2019. Credit: University of Hawaii at Manoa<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Goblin Shark is one of these deep-sea charismatic animals that I never thought we\u2019d see alive, and then to do so was amazing, but to then learn that colleagues in Hawai\u2019i also saw one was just incredible,\u201d said Alan Jamieson, professor and founding director at Minderoo-UWA Deep-Sea Research Center and a study co-author who documented the 2024 sighting.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is really important that we still perform natural history work,\u201d Judah emphasized. \u201cNew discoveries like this demonstrate that there is still so much to explore in our deep ocean home. Given the newly expanded geographic range of the goblin shark, this species can be included in regional management and a nation\u02bbs biodiversity list, whereas, beforehand, we didn\u02bbt know it was even there!\u201d<\/p>\n

Reference: \u201cFirst in situ observations of the goblin shark Mitsukurina owstoni\u201d by Aaron B. Judah, Alan J. Jamieson, Sarah R. D. Bingo, Megan E. Cundy, David A. Ebert, Steven Auscavitch, Harold K. Carlson, Tiffany Nicole G. Cunanan, Hayley B. Sims and Meagan Putts, 19 May 2026, Journal of Fish Biology.
DOI: 10.1111\/jfb.70505<\/a><\/p>\n

This study was funded by NOAA Ocean Exploration, Inkfish LLC, and the Minderoo-UWA Deep-Sea Research Centre.<\/p>\n

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Follow us on Google<\/a> and Google News<\/a>.<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Goblin shark near Tonga Trench (2024). Credit: Minderoo-University of Western Australia Deep-Sea Research Center and Inkfish. Scientists have…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":553811,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[269],"tags":[1868,18,440,19,17,7019,14999,133,15057,8192],"class_list":["post-553810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-biodiversity","tag-eire","tag-environment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-marine-biology","tag-oceanography","tag-science","tag-sharks","tag-university-of-hawaii-at-manoa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116811915621073157","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/553810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=553810"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/553810\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/553811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=553810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=553810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=553810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}