Bjorn Dihle, a former commercial fisherman in Alaska, went for a leisurely kayaking trip roughly 40 miles from the Alaskan capital, Juneau on October from. He never thought he would stumble upon something even crazier than the likes of Dory and Nemo, rather, a five-foot pile of what he believed to be the internal organs of something very large and aquatic.
Dihle explained, “The organs looked and felt like a decomposing liver, and smelt like a fish hold that hadn’t been cleaned in a while – a bit like ammonia.” Naturally, he called in some experts on the matter who labeled it likely to be the liver of a Pacific Sleeper Shark. The Sleeper Shark is typically found at depths of 6,600 feet and has few known predators. These sharks are physically impressive, reaching lengths in excess of 23 feet and often feed on giant Pacific octopuses among other things including porpoises, salmon and other smaller creatures that inhabit the ocean.
The commercial fishing industry has exposed Dihle to sleeper sharks in the past, but the biggest he’s ever seen was roughly 8 feet, which is dwarfed in comparison to the size of the one the liver likely came from. The cause of death may have come from killer whales or even fishermen, but because the liver is typically the safest part of the animal to eat, it seemed rather odd that it went untouched, even by seagulls while it washed up on shore.
Dihle has been writing about the supernatural and unsolved mysteries of Southeast Alaska for the last for the last couple years and this discovery has set him up perfectly for his next segment.