Читать книгу Into the Abyss. Diving to Adventure in the Liquid World онлайн

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The fish tried to take the whole torch in one go into its mouth getting the whole 1-2 inch diameter width of it a few inches down its throat – when it bit down however it encountered, probably for the first time, man-made hard plastics. I expected to see its teeth all fracture and fall out like a Tom & Jerry cartoon scene - but even though the attempt to crack the torch in two wasn’t a good idea for its dental care regime, it held on and simply wouldn’t let go.

My buddy waved his torch about trying to dislodge the fish from the end of it but it wouldn’t – it just hung on for grim life and he did not dare to try using his other hand to prise it off. If it could do this to his torch it could make a nasty job of a finger. Eventually after a degree of thrashing around the anglerfish obviously decided that it had done enough to further our diver training on “things not to touch underwater.” It let go and swam back down to the bottom where it turned round to face us and settled back down on the bottom. “You wanna try that again, laddie?” it seemed to be saying. If it was nursing a bad toothache it didn’t show. We beat a retreat, Angler Fish 1, Divers 0.