On May 4th, 2024, something extraordinary happened off the coast of Gran Canaria in the Canary Islands: a deep sea goblin was brought up from the deep. And while the word “goblin” might evoke a mental image of some green, warted fictional creature, this animal looks nothing like that but is very, very real. Meet the goblin shark (Mitsukurina owstoni), a predator so rare that fewer than 250 individuals have ever been recorded worldwide. And in a scientific article that was just published in late 2025, it was incidentally caught during a recreational fishing trip off the coast of northwestern Africa. Observers estimated the shark to be over 8.2 feet (250 centimeters) long, likely female, and remarkably, it was released alive, swimming back into the depths after a brief 10-15 minute encounter with the surface world. This incident marks the first confirmed record of this species in the Canary Islands… and only the second in the broader Macaronesian region, opening a window into one of the ocean’s most enigmatic predators.
Goblin sharks are immediately recognizable by their flat, elongated snouts, tiny eyes, and jaw structure that seems almost alien. Their jaws can protrude dramatically to snatch prey, lined with long, needle-like teeth perfect for capturing slippery fish and squid in our dimly lit deep sea. A species that grows slowly, they reach maturity at over 8.5 ft (260 cm) for males and more than 13.12 ft (400 cm) for females, with newborns already measuring around 2.6-3 ft (80-90 cm). Reports from the western Atlantic include females exceeding 16.4 ft (500 cm), with one record of a 19.7 ft (600 cm) individual in the Gulf of Mexico. Yet despite their impressive size, encounters with these enigmas remain exceedingly rare due to the myriad of challenges of studying deep-sea sharks. Their distribution appears to be worldwide, but sparse, spanning tropical and temperate waters at depths between 820-4,921 feet (250-1,500 meters). In the eastern Atlantic, most recorded specimens are juveniles or subadults, while larger adults tend to appear in the western Atlantic; this size segregation may reflect ecological preferences, reproductive factors, or unknown environmental pressures.
The capture in Gran Canaria falls into the juvenile-to-subadult size range, suggesting these waters could serve as a nursery or perhaps a migratory corridor. Could the eastern Atlantic serve as a stepping-stone habitat for young sharks before they migrate westward to reach full maturity? If that’s the case, there’s some good news: bottom trawling in the Canary Islands has been absent since the 1980s and targeted fisheries for sharks are limited. Goblin sharks are aplacental viviparous, meaning they give birth to live young without a placenta, nourishing embryos through oophagy, where developing embryos feed on unfertilized eggs. This unusual reproductive strategy, combined with their slow growth and late maturity, makes populations particularly vulnerable to human impacts, even if they live far from heavily fished areas. With at least 20 known deep-sea shark species along its slopes, the Canary Islands could be a key biodiversity hotspot for elasmobranchs, potentially offering refuge from commercial pressures that affect continental shelves. Yet, incidental captures of these sharks still occur through passive fishing gear, which shows that even remote deep-sea habitats/animals are not entirely safe from human influence.
It has been over a century since the species was first described in 1898, yet we still know so little about their life history, migratory patterns, and population health. How can conservation plans or fisheries management strategies be effective if such species remain largely unseen? So while observations like this one are rare, they are of critical importance to the scientific world; each encounter helps researchers map their distribution, clarify habitat preferences, and help reveal subtle patterns in behavior and growth.
Every time we encounter these elusive predators, it also reminds us how little we truly know about the life thriving in the shadows of the deep…
