Giant Squids invade San Diego coast

There's a reason I don't like to go swimming in the ocean. There are things bigger than me in that place. There are things that may try to eat me. And then, there are squids...

SAN DIEGO - Thousands of jumbo flying squid — aggressive 5-foot-long sea monsters with razor-sharp beaks and toothy tentacles — have invaded the shallow waters off San Diego, spooking scuba divers and washing up dead on tourist-packed beaches.

The carnivorous calamari, which can grow up to 100 pounds, came up from the depths last week and swarms of them roughed up unsuspecting divers. Some divers report tentacles enveloping their masks and yanking at their cameras and gear.

Stories of too-close encounters with the alien-like cephalopods have chased many veteran divers out of the water and created a whirlwind of excitement among the rest, who are torn between their personal safety and the once-in-a-lifetime chance to swim with the deep-sea giants.

Once-in-a-lifetime experience? That's because you wont survive swimming with them. I'm all for preserving and exploring nature, just as long as it doesn't involve something with tentacles and beaks that can come in contact with me.

Actually, I think I just described one of my ex-girlfriends.

Predator X was a real sea monster

Growing up I loved dinosaurs. I thought it was fascinating learning all about them. Huge giants that used to roam the same land and seas that humans do now.

The most feared of these was the Tyrannosaurus Rex. Until recently. Enter Predator X.

Now you fellow comic book nerds out there may be saying, "Casey, Predator X was in Marvel comics. Predator X was created by scientists. It was designed to hunt and kill mutants and was a perfect example of extreme genetic engineering."

Well folks, Predator X was real. And he was pretty darn scary.

Predator X remains was discovered last year in the Arctic. The area that it was discovered is so close to the North Pole that scientists are only able to excavate up there for three to four weeks a year.

The fossil remains of this sea reptile were excavated from the permafrost of Svalbard, a group of islands in the Arctic Ocean. Dubbed “Predator X”, the creature was at least 50 feet long and weighed at least 45 tons. It is now believed that the animal was not a dinosaur but a pliosaur, a large, short-necked reptile that lived 147 million years ago.

While it is not the largest sea creature ever found - that would be the 75ft ichthyosaur - Predator X was extremely deadly. It had a ten-foot jaw with a bite force of 33,000 lbs per square inch. To put that into perspective, the Tyrannosaurus Rex 3,000 lbs per square inch. It could have crushed a Hummer!

And if Predator X's bite wasn't a enough to put nightmares in your head at night, it had also evolved to not just swim through the water, but blaze through it.

Predator X also had two hind-fins, which scientists were confused by, as only the front set are necessary for swimming. However, it was deduced that these back fins gave the creature an extra boost of speed when it went in for the kill.

The shape and the size of the brain most closely resembles today’s most perfect predator: the great white shark.

Talk about a lethal creature.