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First for breaking news and analysis: Compelling world news stories from NBC News journalists. Follow us on Twitter and Facebook.

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  • 9
    Jan
    2013
    5:53am, EST

    Captured deep beneath the waves: Giant squid filmed in natural habitat

    Scientists say they have captured video of a giant squid in its natural habitat deep in the ocean for the first time. NBCNews.com's Dara Brown reports.

    By Arata Yamamoto and Peter Jeary, NBC News

    The world's first moving images of a giant squid living in its natural habitat have been captured by a team of scientists more than half a mile below the surface of the Pacific Ocean.

    The ghostly pictures of the 10-foot-long giant squid were recorded from a state-of–the-art submersible carrying a three-person team of Japanese zoologist Tsunemi Kubodera, a camera operator and the submersible’s pilot, who made around 100 dives during an expedition last summer.

    Although small by giant squid standards – the largest ever caught measured 59 feet – it was the first time a live giant squid had been caught on video deep in the ocean.

    Kubodera, from Japan's National Museum of Nature and Science, credited the success to the submersible’s silence and hi-tech lighting.

    "A giant squid would never appear before a pool of light, that possibility is extremely slim", he told NBC News. "That's why we had to use lights that they wouldn't be able to detect. In fact, they're lights even humans wouldn't be able to see either."

    “If you try to approach making a lot of noise, using bright lights, then the squid won't come anywhere near you," he added. “So we sat there in the pitch black, using a near-infrared light invisible even to the human eye, waiting for the giant to approach.''

    'It was stunning'
    On one dive in July 2012, near the Ogasawara islands, 620 miles south of Tokyo, they finally had their close encounter more than 2,000 feet down and followed the creature even deeper.

    “This was the first time for me to see with my own eyes a giant squid swimming,'' Kubodera said. “It was stunning. I couldn't have dreamt that it would be so beautiful. It was such a wonderful creature.”

    NHK/NEP/Discovery Channel via Reuters

    A giant squid is seen in this video still talken near the Ogasawara Islands in July 2012.

    The squid was missing its characteristic two longest tentacles – and scientists don’t know why. Marine biologists said if that pair of tentacles had been intact, the creature would probably have measured up to 23 feet long.

    Kubodera’s deep-sea expedition was the culmination of a 10-year project by Japanese broadcaster NHK to capture pictures of the mysterious creature in its habitat. An  ultra-sensitive high-definition camera was developed to operate at the ocean depths, using special light that was invisible to the sensitive eyes of the giant squid.

    NHK will air its video footage in Japan in a prime-time documentary entitled "Legends of the Deep: Giant Squid" on Jan. 13. It will also be shown on the Discovery Channel on Jan.  27.

    Reuters contributed to this report.

    More world stories from NBC News:

    • 150 years old and still running late: London Tube reaches landmark
    • Family escapes 'tornadoes of fire' by clinging to jetty for 3 hours
    • Video: How happy is the only country to track happiness?
    • Flag debate sparks rioting in Northern Ireland
    • World's best frenemies: Karzai, Obama set for key talks
    • Video: Death art encourages living to seize the day
    • 10ft squid captured on film in natural habitat
    • Experts: 'Horrible' sea level rise plausible by 2100

    Follow World News from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook

     

    243 comments

    That would make a major plate of fried calamari!

    Show more
    Explore related topics: technology, japan, world, science, ocean, wildlife, climate, marine, featured, squid, arata-yamamoto
  • 9
    Jun
    2012
    5:33am, EDT

    Second solo Pacific rower rescued after 50-foot waves batter boat

    By Marian Smith, msnbc.com

    A second solo Pacific rower caught in a tropical storm has been rescued, according to the adventurer's website.

    British ocean-rower Charlie Martell, 41, was picked up by the Russian crew of the MV Last Tycoon at around 9:18 a.m. local time Saturday (4:18 p.m. ET Friday), a message posted on Martell's website said.


    Martell was in good condition and was not injured, having waited on his rowing boat, 'Blossom,' for 36 hours after issuing a mayday signal. The Japanese coast guard alerted the Last Tycoon, which altered course to rescue Martell.

    In earlier reports posted on Martell's website, his support team said he was sustaining "35-foot waves and the occasional 50-footer. Yes, really."

    Another British adventurer, Sarah Outen, 27, was rescued on Friday by the Japanese Coast Guard, having survived the same storm -- which she described as "merciless."

    Solo Brit rower rescued after 'merciless' Pacific storm; another waits for help

    Outen had been on one leg of a round-the-world journey by bicycle, rowing boat and kayak that started on April 1 last year, and was attempting to be the first woman to row from Japan to Canada.


    Follow @msnbc_world

    Martell, meanwhile, was attempting to set records for the fastest crossing of the North Pacific Ocean and the first unsupported row across the Pacific.

    He had been at sea since May 4 and was around 700 miles off the northeast coast of Japan when he issued the mayday signal.

    In the message on Martell's website, his support team thanked the Japanese coast guard for its effort in coordinating the rescue and to Martell's supporters for their "encouraging messages."

    The Last Tycoon was attempting to recover his damaged boat, his support team said.

    Martell is expected to arrive in Vancouver, Canada, in about 10 days.

    More world news from msnbc.com and NBC News:

    • UN: Smell of death at scene of massacre in Syrian village
    • Women brave attack to protest Egypt harassment
    • In court, Italian showgirl reveals code name for Berlusconi
    • Soccer, cable TV at Gitmo? US lockup in Cuba quietly being upgraded
    • Amid simmering unrest, China bans foreigners' travel to Tibet
    • Did Canada's alleged cannibal killer Luka Magnotta strike in LA?
    • TV show attack shows 'real face' of far-right in Greece?

    Follow us on Twitter: @msnbc_world

     

    55 comments

    I have no problem at all with those that wish to be adventurists. I just want them to pick up the tab for their rescue when things go wrong. There is a huge difference between the taxpayers picking up the tab of rescuing a school bus full of kids that fell through a collapsed bridge and some adventu …

    Show more
    Explore related topics: canada, japan, russia, british, pacific, storm, ocean, featured, rower, charlie-martell
  • 11
    May
    2012
    3:42am, EDT

    88,000-mile journey? Plastic card makes landfall in Alaska after 33-year sea voyage

    James Poulson / Daily Sitka Sentinel via AP

    Beachcomber Emmitt Andersen, 12, holds up a plastic card set adrift by NOAA in the 1970s that he found in Sitka, Alaska.

    By Ian Johnston, msnbc.com

    A plastic card dropped into the ocean 33 years ago has been found on the coast of Alaska, after a potential 88,000-mile journey.

    The drift card was one of thousands put into the Bering Sea by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration staff in the late 1970s and early 1980s, as part of a project to find out where oil would go if there was a spill.


    Follow @msnbc_world

    About the size of a postcard, it offered a reward of $1 for its return in three languages: English, Japanese and Russian.


    It was found on a beach at Sealion Cove, near Sitka, Alaska, last month by 12-year-old middle school student and keen beachcomber Emmitt Anderson. "We never know what we're going to find ... I just like to find stuff. When I don't find stuff, I'm not very happy," Anderson told the Daily Sitka Sentinel newspaper.

    'Amazingly good condition'
    His father Steve contacted NOAA and was put in touch with oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer, who tracks flotsam as it rides the world's currents.

    Ebbesmeyer told msnbc.com that Anderson's drift card had likely been caught in the Aleut gyre, circulating ocean currents that take three years to make an 8,000-mile orbit.

    "The question is how many times did it go around? I think it's likely it went around once, it could have gone round 11 times. It's possible it went 88,000 miles. It could have short-circuited the gyre … we'll never quite know," he said.

    Courtesy Curt Ebbesmeyer

    This plastic card may have traveled 88,000 mile, according to oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer.

    "Everything in the ocean, particularly plastic, can travel great, great distances," he added.

    Follow Ian Johnston

    Ebbesmeyer said the drift card was in "amazingly good condition."

    "After 33 years in the ocean, [it] is in quite readable condition," he said. "Plastic doesn't degrade very fast."

    Much of the plastic that finds its way into the sea will travel the world for years to come.

    "Half of all plastic cannot sink because of its specific gravity. It's as if it was in prison in Flatland [a fictional two-dimensional world]," Ebbesmeyer said.

    Study: Plastic in 'Great Pacific Garbage Patch' increases 100-fold

    While Anderson's drift card did not make landing very far from where it was released, others have ended up in Europe.

    "Across the North Pole, down past Greenland, down to almost New York City, over to the vicinity of London, then turn south to France. That's probably the longest certifiable drift," Ebbesmeyer said.

    Even if the Sitka drift card traveled 88,000 miles that may not be the longest ever journey by a piece of plastic in the sea.

    Dec. 29: NBC's Kerry Sanders reports on a huge mass of garbage floating in the Pacific Ocean that is killing marine life and growing larger each day.

    An albatross found on Midway Island in the Pacific in 2004 was found to have 512 pieces of plastic in its stomach.

    One piece was discovered to have come from a downed aircraft from World War II. It was likely caught in the 12,000-mile turtle gyre, which takes about six years to make its full circle.

    Ebbesmeyer said that if that piece of plastic made 10 orbits in 60 years, that would mean it traveled 120,000 miles, equivalent to about five times round the Earth.

    Plastic ducks, frogs
    He also tracks some 28,800 plastic bath toys called Floatees – turtles, ducks, beavers and frogs – that were lost overboard from a container ship in the mid-Pacific in 1992. 

    Hundreds drifted some 2,200 miles and beached -- like Emmett Anderson's drift card -- near Sitka, Alaska.

    To date, a duck was seen in Maine in July 2003, while a green plastic frog was spotted in Scotland in August 2003.

    Ebbesmeyer, who usually gets one or two reports a year about the floating toys, said some of them may be approaching an epic achievement: Circumnavigating the globe.

    "It's possible they have gone something like in the order of round the world," he said.

    More world news from msnbc.com and NBC News:

    • Bad neighbors for Team USA? Occupy camp axed
    • WWII fighter plane found preserved in Sahara Desert
    • Egypt's first TV presidential debate thrills viewers
    • 88,000-mile voyage? Plastic card found after 33 years
    • Hell-raising holy men: Boozy monks caught gambling
    • Sources: Spy who uncovered underwear bomb plot is a Brit
    • Video: Murder and corruption scandal rocks China
    • Move over, Al Roker! Prince Charles becomes weatherman

    Follow us on Twitter: @msnbc_world

    120 comments

    The real question is did he get his dollar!

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    Explore related topics: alaska, environment, ocean, plastic, featured, flotsam, currents, curtis-ebbesmeyer
  • 23
    Apr
    2012
    4:01am, EDT

    Japanese teen traced as owner of tsunami soccer ball found in Alaska

    Noaa - Jiji Press / AFP - Getty Images

    This soccer ball is believed to have drifted from Rikuzentakata, Japan, to Alaska following the March 2011 tsunami.

    By Arata Yamamoto, NBC News, in Tokyo

    A Japanese teenager has identified himself as the owner of a soccer ball that washed up on an Alaska beach last week – the first traceable debris to arrive in the United States from last year's tsunami.

    Misaki Murakami, who comes from the city of Rikuzentakata, where more than 3,000 homes were destroyed, came forward on Sunday after reading news reports about the find.


    Marker pen writing on the soccer ball identified the 16-year-old and the name of his school.

    The soccer ball and a volleyball were discovered by David Baxter, a technician working at a radar station on remote Middleton Island in the Gulf of Alaska, Doug Helton of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration wrote ina  blog post last week.

    Japan’s Kyodo news agency said Murakami was at home at the time of the tsunami disaster in March 2011 but managed to escape the waves by running to higher ground with his pet dog.

    Kyodo via Reuters

    Misaki Murakami, 16, says he is the owner of a soccer ball that was found on the shore of a remote Alaska island.

    His family lost everything, including their home, and are currently living in temporary housing provided by the local government.

    Ghost ship sinks to bottom of Gulf of Alaska 

    Murakami told the news agency Sunday that he had been searching for his family's belongings but that until the ball was found he had had no luck.

    Prized possession
    The ball was a gift from his former homeroom teacher and his 13 classmates when he had to change schools in the same area seven years ago.

    He said it was a prized possession, which he always kept hanging in a net next to his bed.

    Kyodo News via AP

    David and Yumi Baxter hold the soccer ball and a volleyball at their home in Alaska.
    Doug Helton of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said that there wasn't enough information on the volleyball for Japanese officials to locate its possible owner.

    Murakami spoke with Baxter on the phone to thank him for finding his treasured ball.

    The magnitude 9.0 earthquake off Japan's northeast coast on March 11, 2011, triggered a 75-foot wall of water that flattened waterfront towns, killing 16,000. About 3,000 people are still unaccounted for. The tsunami triggered a crisis at Tokyo Electric Power's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, forcing tens of thousands of people to flee in the world's worst nuclear accident in 25 years.

    Slideshow: Triple tragedy for Japan

    An earthquake, a tsunami, a nuclear meltdown -- residents of Japan's northeast coast suffered through three intertwined disasters after a massive 9.0 magnitude temblor struck off the coast on March 11, 2011.

    Launch slideshow

    U.S. authorities were immediately aware that the clockwise circulation of the Pacific's northern waters would deliver some remnants of that destruction to American shores.

    A Japanese ghost ship, Ryou-Un Maru, turned up earlier in the Gulf of Alaska off Southeast Alaska after a 4,500-mile journey. The U.S. Coast Guard sank the vessel April 5.

    Tracking the debris from the Japan tsunami can be tricky, as it moves across the Pacific via ocean currents and winds. NBC's Miguel Almaguer reports.

    In January, a half-dozen large buoys suspected to be from Japanese oyster farms appeared at the top of Alaska's panhandle and may be among the first tsunami debris.

    State health and environmental officials have said there's little need to be worried that debris landing on Alaska's shores will be contaminated by radiation.

    More world news from msnbc.com and NBC News:

    • Iran says it is building a copy of downed US spy drone
    • Anglican official: Front-runner for top church job victim of 'naked racism'
    • Poachers attack rhinos featured in Rock Center report
    • Attack foiled? Afghanistan arrests five with 11 tons of explosives
    • Russian ships arriving in China for naval war game
    • American in Cuban prison: 'Get me the hell out of here'

    Follow us on Twitter: @msnbc_world

    134 comments

    "The soccer ball and a volleyball were discovered by David Baxter, about a technician working at a radar station on remote Middleton Island, in the Gulf of Alaska...." MSNBC really needs to hire better proofreaders, or at least use "spell check". Mr. Baxter is not "about a technician". Having to r …

    Show more
    Explore related topics: japan, alaska, tsunami, debris, environment, ocean, featured, wonderful-world

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