The severely decayed remains of a marine creature recently washed up on a beach in Papua New Guinea. Experts can't agree on what the ghostly white lump is, but it is most likely the remains of a marine mammal.

A ghostly white lump of rotten flesh in the shape of a mermaid recently washed ashore on an island in Papua New Guinea — and experts baffled.

The strange sea creature was likely a marine mammal, but its exact origins are unclear, experts told Live Science.

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It is known as a globster — an unidentified organic mass that washes ashore. The origin of these mystery lumps is hard to pin down because much of the corpse has rotted away and most are missing body parts that have fallen off at sea. In this case, most of the creature’s head and large chunks of its flesh are missing.

There is no information on the size and weight of the corpse because it was not properly measured before locals buried it, NIO representatives told Live Science. And no one collected DNA samples, which makes a proper identification almost impossible.

      • Treczoks
        1·
        1 year ago

        You don’t need a “scientist” for that. Any medical personnel shoukd have a good chance to sufficiently preserve a piece of the specimen. If they had questions about how to do that, they could always call or radio a hospital or even university - the latter would probably be more than happy to lend support in such a case.

  • mindbleach@sh.itjust.works
    1·
    1 year ago

    It’s possible these were never part of a complete animal. The ocean is huge, and some animals survive simply by being too big and fatty to prey on. These might be the wild equivalent of HeLa cells - a tumor that went feral. Cancer as a self-sustaining organism. This would explain other blobs that were examined (however hastily) and showed a variety of tissues in rough structures but were otherwise incomprehensible. There’d be no puzzle those pieces fit.