The story
A globster is a big, hard-to-identify lump of flesh that washes up on a beach. Writer Ivan T. Sanderson coined the word in 1962 for a Tasmanian carcass said to have no eyes, no head and no bones. Many were first called giant octopuses or sea serpents.
On 30 November 1896 two boys found a huge pale mass on Anastasia Island near St. Augustine, Florida. The local doctor, DeWitt Webb, measured about 18 ft by 7 ft of it above the sand, estimated it at around 5 tons and thought he saw arm stumps. Yale's Addison Verrill first suggested a giant squid, then named it Octopus giganteus, then decided it came from a whale. Tests on preserved samples in 1971 and 1986 seemed to support an octopus, but a 1995 analysis concluded it was the collagen-rich matrix of whale blubber, probably from a sperm whale.
In August 1960 a 20 ft by 18 ft mass covered in white bristles washed up near Interview River in western Tasmania; it was identified as a whale in 1981. In July 2003 a 13-tonne blob on Pinuno Beach at Los Muermos, Chile, was hailed as an unknown giant octopus until DNA tests in 2004 matched it to a sperm whale. The whale had died months earlier, and only its tough collagen fibres were left. Globsters in Bermuda (1988 and 1997), Nantucket (1996) and Newfoundland have also turned out to be whales.
What was shown or claimed
- A huge, pale, rubbery mass with no head or bones
- White fibres that look like hair or fur
- Flesh so tough it is hard to cut
- Flaps that look like arms or tentacles
Timeline
- 1896St. Augustine Monster found on Anastasia Island
St. Augustine, FloridaIn late 1896 two boys found a huge mass of tough tissue on Anastasia Island near St. Augustine, Florida, and local physician DeWitt Webb examined it. It was long promoted as a giant octopus. A 1995 analysis concluded it was a large mass of whale blubber, probably from a sperm whale.
- 1960Tasmanian Globster washes ashore
Interview River, TasmaniaIn August 1960 a 20-foot mass with no eyes or obvious bones washed ashore north of the Interview River in western Tasmania. It inspired Ivan Sanderson to coin the word 'globster'. In 1981 it was identified as the remains of a whale.
- 2003Chilean blob found on Pinuno Beach
Los Muermos, ChileIn July 2003 a 12-metre, 13-tonne mass of tissue washed ashore on Pinuno Beach in Los Muermos, Chile, sparking talk of an unknown giant octopus. In 2004 DNA tests showed it was the remains of a sperm whale, a mass of fatty tissue left after the carcass decayed.
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