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The mystery of the Deception Pass sea monster
Back in the 1950s, the Loch Ness Monster was competing with another mythical beast lurking in the Puget Sound.
WHIDBEY ISLAND, Wash. - Forget the monster under your bed this Halloween. What about the one once said to be lurking beneath the waters near Deception Pass?
Reports of a sea serpent made headlines across Washington in the 1950s. Today, those old newspaper accounts offer a mystery for wildlife veterinarian and scientist Joe Gaydos of the SeaDoc Society: What were people actually seeing?
"We love the mystery right? And the ocean is just full of mysteries," said Gaydos.
A creature that drew crowds
The backstory:
One headline from 1958 declared: "Loch Ness in Scotland has nothing on Whidbey Island."
The creature was described as light brown, 12 feet long and 12 inches in diameter. Reports out of Anacortes added another unusual detail: a tuft of black hair on its head.
According to Anacortes city lore, even The Associated Press reported on the animal. People reportedly came to gawk, with some cutting off pieces to keep as souvenirs.
But the descriptions alone leave questions about what the creature could have been.
FOX 13 brought the old reports to Gaydos, who walked through several possibilities, from deep-water fish to sharks found in the Salish Sea.
Could it have been a shark?
Local perspective:
An oarfish might seem like a candidate for a sea serpent sighting because of its size and shape. But Gaydos ruled it out, saying an oarfish has never been seen in the Salish Sea.
Other possibilities included a sixgill shark, a basking shark or a lancetfish
Sixgill shark (top left), a basking shark (top right) and a lancetfish (bottom)
According to Gaydos, sixgill sharks feed near the surface and have washed up on beaches in the Salish Sea.
Basking sharks can reach 30 feet long. While gentle, they can look frightening to someone unfamiliar with them, he said.
"If that thing washed up on the beach it would terrify people, especially if they hadn’t heard of it," said Gaydos.
Lancetfish were lower on his list because they live in very deep water. Their appearance, however, could certainly fuel a frightening description.
"These are fish of the deep and imagine your worst nightmare while you’re swimming. This is a long eel like fish that has just giant teeth," said Gaydos.
His strongest guess: A wolf eel
If Gaydos had to put money on an explanation, he would choose a wolf eel.
"It can grow to be eight feet long and its head is almost probably as big as my head," said Gaydos.
Wolf eel
He described large jowls and sharp teeth that nearly stick out of it’s mouth.
That remains his strongest guess, rather than a confirmed identification of the creature described in the old reports.
More beneath the surface
Dig deeper:
How could a marine animal be mistaken for a sea serpent in 1958?
Gaydos pointed out that scuba diving was still new at the time, giving people fewer opportunities to see what lived beneath the surface.
"People didn’t have submarines and so there was all of this unknown and there’s still a lot of unknown so it’s not surprising that people are looking out there and wondering what something is and conjuring up cool ideas about it," said Gaydos.
Today, more than 260 species of fish are known to inhabit the Salish Sea, according to Gaydos.
"We live in a hugely biodiverse place," said Gaydos.
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The Source: Information in this story came from the SeaDoc Society and FOX 13 Seattle reporting.