WELLINGTON -- The capture of the world's biggest octopus ever found has highlighted just how little we know about the creatures of the oceans, DPA quoted an expert as saying. Dr Steve O'Shea, a scientist with New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA), and an expert in squid -- especially the giants famous in maritime legend and science fiction as monsters of the deep -- could hardly believe his eyes when the massive creature was delivered to NIWA's museum laboratory. The octopus was caught nearly a kilometer beneath the sea off New Zealand's Chatham Islands, 860 kilometers off the New Zealand mainland. The catch was recently reported in NIWA's quarterly journal. The 61 kilogram preserved frozen lump sent to him turned out to be the first example of the very rare Haliphron Atlanticus species of octopus ever caught in the South Pacific. It also is the largest specimen ever seen in the Atlantic and Indian oceans and the North Pacific, the only areas where it had previously been identified, and the biggest octopus discovered worldwide. It died as it was brought to the surface and was damaged by the heavy trawl net used in deep waters. Its mantle, or head, was 69 centimeters long, while its total length was 2.9 meters. O'Shea said most haliphron caught have been juveniles and scientific literature has put the size of the average adult at about a 40 centimeter mantle and a total length of 2.0 meters. "If this one had not been damaged and missing half its arms, it would easily have been 4 meters long and weighed 75 kilogram plus, and that's a conservative estimate," he told Deutsche Presse-Agentur DPA. He said little was known about the Haliphron, though the females, like the one he now has thawed out in his laboratory, have been recorded to brood eggs within their arms. There was no way of telling if it was a single creature migrating on some course not previously identified or part of a Haliphron population that had miraculously escaped capture so far by commercial fishing boats in the area known as Chatham Rise. "Either they have escaped trawl nets for decades or they usually reside in areas and/or at depths that we have yet to regularly sample." So what is the wider significance of the giant octopus find? Creatures like this are the principal diet of sperm whales, a protected species, O'Shea, 36, said, and being able to study the biology of the Haliphron will help scientists understand the whales better. "Understanding the Haliphron could help us save the whale," he said. "There are many things I would like to know about this animal for a start, whether it actually resides in New Zealand waters or where it comes from? "There is so much we don't know about our oceans."

Japan Plans Powerful Version of New Rocket Tokyo Japan plans to develop a more powerful version of its latest rocket and cut costs at the same time to boost its attempt to enter the commercial satellite launch business, Reuters quoted Japanese media as saying on Saturday. Under the plan, two main engines will be added to the H-2A rocket to boost payload capability for flights to the International Space Station, Kyodo news agency said, quoting National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) sources. Kyodo said the revision was decided because costs will be nearly 10 percent lower than enhancing H-2A's payload with liquid rocket boosters. Conventional H-2A rockets can carry a cargo of four tons, but the powerful version will be able to transport 1.5 times that amount, Kyodo added. But Japan plans to continue using the current H-2A rockets to put satellites into orbit, Kyodo said. After failures in 1998 and 1999, Japan succeeded in launching the H-2A in February, but it failed to put a test satellite into orbit, putting a question mark over its space program. The H-2A already faces an uphill battle in the global satellite launch market, which is dominated by European Ariane rockets, followed by U.S., Chinese and Russian space launches.