‘Breathtaking’: Diver Describes Her Encounter with Human-Sized Barrel Jellyfish

A diver has described her “unforgettable experience” of a chance encounter with a rare human-sized jellyfish off the south-western coast of England this week.

Broadcaster and biologist Lizzie Daly described her encounter with the eight-armed creature near Falmouth, Cornwall, as "breathtaking."

"What an unforgettable experience," she said. "I know barrel jellyfish get really big in size but I have never seen anything like it before!"

"It was the best thing I've ever done," she said in a video of the meeting, CNN reports.

Daly, who was exploring the waters as part of her campaign "Wild Ocean Week," added the

jellyfish was her size.

Barrel jellyfish are the largest species of jellyfish in British seas, but it is extremely rare to spot one of the sizes Daly did, according to CNN.

Barrel jellyfish, which can typically grow up to one meter (3.2 feet) and weigh up to 25 kilograms, are frequently washed up along the UK's coastlines during summers, according to The Wildlife Trusts.

There have been more sightings of these gigantic creatures this week than in the last 15

years, The Sun quoted marine experts as saying.

This year, hundreds have been washed up on beaches across Cornwall and Devon, according to The Sun.

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“There are more barrel jellyfish around the coast of SW England than I have ever seen in 15-plus years of sea kayaking,” a blogger Rupert Kirkwood wrote earlier this year.