Giant Squid Washes Ashore in Santa Monica (Not Really)

Well a lot of people, perhaps East Coasters suffering from the Polar Vortex and are jealous of our summer-like weather, circulated on social media Thursday The Lightly Braised Turnip’s satire piece about a giant cephalopod washing up on Santa Monica’s shoreline.

Santa Monicans, of course, know better and are not so easily fooled. After all, with our three-mile coastline, it’s easy enough to check. Though, it’s understandable how people suffering from hypothermia (conjecture on this reporter’s part) could believe it to be true. The “story” looks convincing enough.

It quotes Santa Monica Park Manager Cynthia Beard (not a real person) saying that scientists from the Scripps Research Institute (a real institute) intend to study the creature. The article is a follow up to an earlier satire piece about another giant sea creature washing up on California shores. These creatures, it claims, were a result of result of “radioactive gigantism” from the effects of the Fukushima Daichi Nuclear Power Plant disaster in 2011.

The disaster has been in news recently because of several supposed alternative news websites that were reporting high levels of radiation in the waters along California’s coast that originated from Fukushima. According to California Department of Public Health officials, there is no danger to the public as radiation levels have gone down ever since it was first detected two years ago.

The Lightly Braised Turnip is a satire online newspaper, similar to the Onion, though it does not have a disclaimer on its website.

As for the squid in the photo, it is a real giant squid that washed ashore in Spain in 2013, but it has been manipulated to look much bigger than it actually was. Giant squids can grow as big as 40 feet in length but is no where near the length described in the fake story.

Of course, Santa Monica is used to, by now, giant fictional creatures attacking its shores. Does anyone remember when King Kong attacked the pier?