A group of young divers enjoyed an encounter with a rarely seen prickly shark at La Jolla Cove, sharks that typically inhabit extremely deep Pacific waters.

SAN DIEGO — The La Jolla coast is home to a wide array of aquatic life, but a group of divers was surprised when they came face-to-face with a rarely seen deep-water shark. 

 “I was like, this is probably going to be a once-in-a-lifetime experience that I just had,” Cali Lingle, a marine biology graduate student at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography, said. 

Lingle and three others went for a night dive at La Jolla Cove last week and captured video of the shark. 

 “It was just checking us out. It turned around and just looked at us a few times. It was probably confused by our light,” Lingle said. 

The group, including Liam Dougherty, an avid recreational diver, estimated the shark to be at least 7 feet long. 

“I was terrified. I’m terrified of sharks,” Dougherty said. 

Dougherty filmed footage of the shark. The next day, the group showed the video to researchers at Scripps, who confirmed the divers had encountered a prickly shark, also known as Echinorhinus cookei, a creature rarely seen by humans. 

Prickly sharks are bottom dwellers in the Pacific Ocean, typically living 300 to more than 2,000 feet deep in colder water. 

“So here, since our water temperature’s a little warmer, it’s unusual to see the shark as shallow as the divers did,” Zach Merson, a Scripps PhD student who studies sharks, said. 

Merson told CBS 8 that the sighting is not a cause for concern. 

“Here in La Jolla, we have a submarine canyon. So, we have a really deep habitat right next to a really shallow habitat. So, it’s not surprising at all that prickly sharks will come up sometimes to look for food in that shallower habitat,” Merson said. 

Their diet includes fish, squid, octopus and other sharks. 

Prickly sharks are non-aggressive to humans, but they are wild animals, so Merson advises that if one does have a close encounter with any shark, keep a distance and be respectful of the creatures.Â