As Dr Michelle Taylor took a moment to breathe in the icy Antarctic air, a stark realisation sunk in. The nearest humans, aside from her immediate colleagues, were hundreds of miles away on the International Space Station. The researcher and her team were on a quest to find undiscovered marine life in one of the most remote places on the planet. What was it like hunting in the deep sea for the unknown?
University of Essex academic Dr Taylor was in the south Chilean city of Punta Arenas earlier this year when she received a text.
It was sent by a woman she had met in a pub a few days before, who said she was looking to find an elusive colossal squid.
This woman, Kat Bolstad, had seen a video shared by Dr Taylor’s team of researchers from their deep sea expedition, which was blowing up on social media.
“Michelle, people keep tagging me in this video,” she wrote.
“I’ve taken as good a look as I can and I’m 80% sure you’ve filmed a colossal squid.”
Not many people outside of scientific circles were aware of Ocean Census’s 35-day quest when the R/V Falkor set off from Chile in March.
But Dr Taylor knew filming this squid, so rare that it still straddles the line between legend and reality today, was about to propel her work to the world.
The discovery made headlines across the globe. A colossal squid had not been seen for 100 years, let alone caught on camera.