STUDY
IN “THE TELEVISION event of the past 10,000 years,” the Time Travel Channel debuted its decade-in-the-making special Ice Rage Live from Madison Square Garden. Much to the delight of the capacity crowd, MC Willie Stevens unveiled a pair of cloned woolly mammoths.
“The fun’s not over yet!” Stevens declared. After parading the mammoths around, producers dimmed the lights for the showstopper: a pair of gargantuan saber-toothed tigers.
The prehistoric cats certainly stopped the show. The smell of the mammoths triggered something hidden in the tigers’ DNA. Some ancient hunting instinct traced back to their Ice Age roots. They snapped off their leashes and attacked one of the mammoths. The other mammoth stepped in to defend its cousin. Within seconds, a full-on Ice Rage brawl was under way within Madison Square Garden. Handlers were unable to control them. The fight spilled onto the streets of Midtown.
“The live special beat the 2013 Super Bowl in the ratings,” boasts producer Natasha Wolfe. “Did people lose their lives? Yes. We regret that deeply. As they say, better luck next time—can’t wait for Ice Rage 2.”
WEIRD SCIENCE
This may come as a shock, but saber-toothed tigers aren’t tigers. In fact, they aren’t even part of the same big cat genus as tigers. “If you want to be technical about it, their scientific name is actually Smilodon,” Natasha Wolfe says. “But that sounds cartoonish. You’d imagine a Smilodon to have a goofy grin on its face. ‘Saber-toothed tiger’ sounds more ferocious, though, like they have lightsabers for teeth … Hey, that’s not such a bad idea.”
AVOID
ALTHOUGH THE ICE Rage monsters were finally brought down by the NYPD, you never know what prehistoric monstrosity the Time Travel Channel will let loose next. Hit them where it hurts. Change the channel. Stop supporting cheap stunts like Ice Rage Live from Madison Square Garden.
SURVIVE
IF A SABER-TOOTHED tiger is fighting a mammoth, chances are neither animal will pay attention to you unless you make yourself known. They’re acting out an age-old conflict—let them go at it. Still, if the tiger leaps through your picture window, be ready.
• Try feeding the saber-toothed tiger before it feeds on you. Who’s to say the saber-toothed tiger wouldn’t be satisfied with a little Purina Fancy Feast Sea Bass and Shrimp Appetizer in Delicate Broth?
• Along those same lines, try distracting it with a laser pointer. If the saber-toothed tiger is anything like your house cat, it will never catch on. After a while, you may even feel guilty making it chase that little red dot.
Four Signs You Have Accidentally Adopted a Saber-Toothed Tiger
You picked up the cutest, most adorable kitten at the pet store. But is she the spawn of a prehistoric killer? Here’s what to watch out for.
1. Your kitty has abnormally long canine teeth.
2. Your kitty tries to jump inside your freezer whenever you get ice cream.
3. Your kitty grows fast. Too fast. She’s six weeks old, but is already the size of your full-grown yellow Lab.
4. Your kitty eats your yellow Lab.
Destruction If by Sea
DINOSHARK
VITALS
ALSO KNOWN AS: Pliosaur • FIRST OBSERVED: Puerto Vallarta, Mexico (2010) • EST. MAX. SPEED: Unknown • HIGH-RISK GROUPS: Water-Polo Players, Cabin Boys • LOOK OUT FOR IT IN: Saltwater • THREAT TO HUMANITY: • RISK OF ENCOUNTER: • FIN’S WTF FACTOR:
DESPITE THE NAME, THE DINOSHARK ISN’T A shark. It isn’t even a fish. This spiked, armored goliath is a sea reptile of the phylum Pliosauridae. Archaeologists believed they went extinct 150 million years ago—until one was killed in Mexico this century. Dinosharks have also been sighted in Japan, New Zealand, and North Carolina.
STUDY
IN 2007, A large aquatic animal attacked a boat off the coast of Alaska. The creature swallowed the ship’s emergency position-indicating radio beacon (EPIRB). In 2010, authorities tracked the EPIRB to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, the site of additional boat attacks. Survivors reported seeing a twenty-foot-long, horned sea creature. One witness went so far as to call it a “dinoshark.” Marine biologist Carol Brubaker didn’t believe a prehistoric shark was terrorizing the Mexican coast.
“The mighty megalodon went extinct 1.5 million years ago. It simply wasn’t possible that it had returned,” she says. “It had to be something else, like the newly discovered swamp shark” (see SWAMP SHARK). When the dinoshark surfaced long enough for her to get a good look at it, she was speechless. This was a creature older than the megalodon by over a hundred million years.
When the dinoshark tore apart one of Brubaker’s friends, things became personal. Trace McGraw, a full-time drifter and part-time tour guide, shared her vendetta. “Rita Valdez fed me,” McGraw says of their mutual friend. “We were six or seven. I guess I was the poor kid with no lunch money. So every day, this girl Rita would come to school with an extra lunch. That was the first time that I ever tasted food made with love.”
Rather than waiting for military reinforcements, Brubaker and McGraw took the matter into their own hands. After a grueling hunt, they finally lodged a harpoon through the dinoshark’s eye and into its brain. By then, the prehistoric man-eater’s death toll was well into double digits, including half of Mexico’s Olympic-bound women’s water-polo team—a devastating blow to the world of sport.
AVOID
PUERTO VALLARTA WAS once named La ciudad más amigable del mundo (“the friendliest city in the world,” not to be confused with the friendliest city in the galaxy, Mos Eisley). Multitudes of tourists visit Puerto Vallarta’s resorts every year, making it one of the most popular vacation spots in Mexico. Unfortunately, the more people in the water, the more kicking and splashing feet to attract the attention of predators.
• Go somewhere else on vacation, someplace cold. There are plenty of other places to vacation. Like Alaska. On second thought, maybe that’s not such a great idea either—the dinoshark was originally thawed from an Alaskan glacier.
• Make your next vacation a staycation. Order takeout. Catch up on your Netflix queue. Relax around the house. Unless, of course, you live in Puerto Vallarta.
Dinoshark vs. Megalodon
As stated earlier, dinosharks aren’t sharks. This is good news. If a prehistoric shark on the scale of the megalodon were to return today, it would dwarf the so-called dinoshark by at least ten feet. American actor and sharkophile Wil Wheaton called the megalodon “one of the coolest megasharks ever … This thing was freaking huge, with teeth the size of an adult human’s hand…[but] it is very, very extinct.” Or is it, Wil?
Dinoshark Megalodon
Weight 5–45 tons 100+ tons
Length 12–50 feet 60+ feet
Tooth Length (Diagonal) 4–5 inches 7+ inches
Bite Strength 10–18 tons 20+ tons
Diet Fish, sea dinosaurs, marine reptiles Whales, fish, squids
Lived 199.6–65.6 million years ago 28–1.5 million years ago
WEIRD SCIENCE
Carol Brubaker believes the dinoshark was woken from a state of suspended animation when the Alaskan glacier it was in thawed. Climate change caused the glacier to break, unleashing the 150-million-year-old sea reptile. “I study organisms living at below-normal temperatures,” cryptobiologist Dr. Simon Otis says. “As bizarre as it sounds, some arctic species develop antifreeze proteins that allow them to go into a state of hibernation when temperatures dip too low. It’s highly improbable that a prehistoric species could survive in ice for millions of years. But is it out of the question? No.”
SURVIVE
YOU WENT TO the beach. We don’t blame you. It was a nice day. You just wanted to feel the sand between your toes. But now there’s a dinoshark swimming your way.
• Get out of the water. This applies to all water-based threats in this chapter. Whatever you do … GET OUT OF THE WATER! Especially if someone is yelling at you in all caps, “GET OUT OF THE WATER!”
• Don’t be a hero. If someo
ne is treading water close by while a dinoshark circles, you may think of jumping in to save him or her. For some reason, people love jumping in the water when someone is in need. Altruism? Heroism? Stupidity? When a dinoshark is in the water, you’re not only sacrificing yourself—you’re overfeeding the monster.
• The best defense is a good offense—specifically, a harpoon gun. If you’re on a boat, your options are limited. Dinosharks can swim as fast as any boat, and strike a hole through the hull as well. While the Puerto Vallarta dinoshark measured twenty feet, adults can grow up to fifty feet—meaning it could easily punch a hole in a Regal Islands International cruise ship. Fight back, or become the next victim. According to McGraw, the creature’s exterior is resistant to gunfire and grenade blasts. The weak spots are its mouth and eyes. Possibly its genitals, though we don’t recommend taking the time to look for those. A harpoon through an eye stopped the Puerto Vallarta dinoshark. That’s a difficult shot to make, even for an experienced marksman at close range. But we have faith in you. We’ll just be waiting right … over … here…
ELEKTROKRAKEN
VITALS
ALSO KNOWN AS: Killer Kraken • FIRST OBSERVED: London, England (2010) • EST. MAX. SPEED: 30 mph • HIGH-RISK GROUPS: Fishermen, Whales, Fishermen From Wales • LOOK OUT FOR IT IN: Saltwater • THREAT TO HUMANITY: • RISK OF ENCOUNTER: • FIN’S WTF FACTOR:
FOR CENTURIES, GIANT SQUID HAVE TERRORIZED FISHERMEN off the coasts of Norway and Greenland. Now they (the squid, not the fishermen) are coming for the rest of us. The legends didn’t exaggerate the creature’s gargantuan size—fifty feet from the head to the tips of its tentacles—but they grossly underestimated its destructive potential. Each of the so-called elektrokraken’s arms packs enough voltage to cook Moby Dick. As if the elektrokraken wasn’t enough of a bad dream, it releases black ink that causes nightmarish hallucinations.
STUDY
IN THE LATE twentieth century, overfishing in the Norwegian Sea began to affect the food chain. Without fish to feed on, whales started dying out. Then, as whale populations decreased, elektrokrakens, who depended on them for food, starved.
In 2010, a hungry elektrokraken swam south. The monster attacked a fishing boat in the North Sea, killing dozens. Only Captain Abraham Peters survived the creature’s onslaught. British marine ecologist Victoria Metherham interviewed him the next day.
“He was blathering on about a giant squid that electrocuted his crew,” she says. “I could smell the whiskey on his breath. He told me he’d never drunk a day in his life—until the attack.”
When the giant squid attacked her research boat, she couldn’t deny the elektrokraken’s existence. Not only was it real, it was heading straight for London’s River Thames. It wouldn’t find any whales there, but it would find the next best thing: dozens of lean athletes competing in the World Rowing Championships. Government authorities dismissed her warnings. “They thought I was as nuts as Ahab,” she says.
Nuts or not, someone had to stop the elektrokraken before it reached the Thames. Metherham joined forces with Captain Peters, who was looking for revenge against the creature. Without a boat to call their own, they commandeered the French crew’s rowboat at the World Rowing Championships. Metherham and Peters tracked the elektrokraken’s movements by measuring the faint electrical impulses it generated when swimming. After luring it close to the rowboat with chum, they shot it with a harpoon wired to a portable generator. The generator’s charge overloaded the elektrokraken’s electrical cells, killing it at once. And in case you’re interested, the French rowboat team forfeited their race.
Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick (Excerpt)
Stories of giant squid have long enthralled readers. In this excerpt from an early draft of Moby-Dick, Herman Melville describes a fictional encounter with the creature we now call the elektrokraken.
Lo! a beast rose to the water’s surface beside our boat. Almost forgetting for the moment all thoughts of Moby Dick, we now gazed at the most wondrous phenomenon that the secret seas have hitherto revealed to mankind. A vast pulpy mass lay floating in the water, innumerable long arms radiating from its center, curling and twisting like a nest of anacondas, as if blindly to catch at any hapless object within reach. It eyed us suspiciously before disappearing back into the murky depths with a brilliant blue flash of light.
Starbuck, still gazing at the agitated waters where it had sunk, with a wild voice exclaimed, “Almost rather had I seen Moby Dick and fought him, than to have seen thee, thou electric ghost!”
“What was that monstrosity?” said I.
“The great electric kraken. They say few whale-ships ever beheld its blue light and returned to their ports to tell of it.”
But Ahab appeared unimpressed. “We are on a mission. We do not have time to be distracted by calamari,” said the captain, heading below deck. “If that damned squid shows its face again, call me, Ishmael, for I shall take it out with my own fists.”
AVOID
AVOID BECOMING ELEKTROKRAKEN prey by following this simple advice:
• Think twice about becoming a commercial fisherman. Long hours that never seem to end. Difficult, back-breaking work. Terrible weather. Everyone knows the fishing life is rough. Throw in elektrokraken attacks, and it’s just plain suicidal.
• If you do go fishing, wear Crocs. When an elektrokraken shocks your boat with an electrical charge, don’t be caught off guard. Insulate your feet. Rubbery, waterproof Crocs work well. The other fishermen may laugh at your choice of footwear. They won’t be laughing when they’re dead.
CRAZY CONSPIRACY
One of the deadliest maritime disasters occurred on April 15, 1912, when the RMS Titanic sank into the North Atlantic Ocean. Trouble began the day before, when a lookout spotted an iceberg in the ship’s path at 11:40 p.m. Despite attempts to maneuver around the obstacle, Titanic collided with the iceberg. Or so historians believe. Conspiracy theorists aren’t so sure. How difficult is it to drive around a chunk of ice? The ship was attacked by an elektrokraken, they say. Some even wonder if the creature was drawn to Titanic by some mystical force, like that diamond Kate Winslet wears in the movie. Even if it didn’t happen in real life, that would have been a much better film.
SURVIVE
NO MATTER THE precautionary measures you take, you may still encounter an elektrokraken. Wearing your Crocs? Good. That’s just the first step (no pun intended).
DON’T: Fall overboard. When an elektrokraken is shaking your boat, grab hold of something solid and stationary. Make sure it’s not metal, unless you’re hoping to save on your electroshock therapy bill.
DO: Boat with friends. If you’re sprayed in the face with the elektrokraken’s hallucinatory ink, someone needs to talk you down before you try flying from the top of the mast.
DON’T: Take pictures of the elektrokraken. Every time a colossal squid washes ashore, photos of it make the rounds on the Internet. No matter how tempted you are, stash your camera phone. Survival is more important than page views or retweets.
DO: Chainsaw the monster’s arms off. Fin suggested this one. While we don’t exactly know why you would have a chainsaw on a boat, wear rubber gloves if you’re going to attempt to carve up an elektrokraken.
GATOROID
VITALS
ALSO KNOWN AS: Mega Gator • FIRST OBSERVED: Miami, Florida (2011) • EST. MAX. SPEED: 20 mph • HIGH-RISK GROUPS: Mega Pythons, Women Who Bear an Uncanny Resemblance to ’80s Pop Starlets • LOOK OUT FOR IT IN: Florida • THREAT TO HUMANITY: • RISK OF ENCOUNTER: • FIN’S WTF FACTOR:
AN ALLIGATOR’S JAWS ARE EVEN MORE POWERFUL than a shark’s. Pump it full of performance-enhancing drugs until it’s as big as a Greyhound bus, and it could swallow a great white. Gatoroids are surprisingly quick and agile for their size. While they prefer the taste of their unnatural enemy, the mega python, they’ll settle for overturning your car to get at the fresh meat inside.
STUDY
WHEN HUNTERS COULDN’T contain the Evergl
ades’ invasive Burmese python population in 2011, park ranger Terry O’Hara devised an ingenious plan. She would singlehandedly restore nature’s balance.
“We need a bigger gator. The balance of nature must be preserved,” herpetologist Diego Ortiz recalls the park ranger saying. “She introduced anabolic steroids and experimental growth hormones into the gators’ food supply. You have to understand that she was incredibly distraught at the time. Her fiancé had been killed by one of the snakes. The entire ecosystem of the Everglades hung in the balance. She felt the pythons were coming for her, to take away everything she held dear.”
Unexpectedly, the gators multiplied in size. Their bones were barely able to carry their oversized muscles. These “gatoroids” fought back against the pythons, temporarily evening the score. Eventually, O’Hara was forced to destroy the monsters she’d helped create (see MEGA PYTHON for the rest of the story).
AVOID
ALLIGATORS HAVE BEEN around millions of years longer than human beings. We’re living with them, not the other way around. Thankfully, alligators are native to just two places on Earth: the United States and China. Unfortunately, a quarter of the world’s population lives in those two countries.
How to Survive a Sharknado and Other Unnatural Disasters Page 9