A rare oarfish, believed to portend disaster, washed up on a beach in Encinitas last week. Since 1901, only 21 oarfish have been recorded on California’s shores. This is the second this year.

For the second time this year, an oarfish has washed up on a California beach. The 'doomsday fish' is considered a harbinger of doom in Japanese folklore.

A rare fish, regarded as a harbinger of doom, has washed up on the shore of Encinitas in southern California.It is the second time this year that an oarfish has been found in the area.Sightings are very rare,

SFGATE reports how the oarfish — which is an incredibly rare sea creature that can stretch up to 12 feet in length — was spotted on the sand of Grandview Beach in Encinitas a couple of weeks ago. According to a Facebook post published by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography,

A member of the Scripps Oceanography team spotted the dead fish outside of San Diego, California. The fish was estimated to be 9 to 10 feet in length, which was much smaller than the one recovered in La Jolla in August.

Kelp, that can’t be good. A rare, massive fish known as the harbinger of doom has washed up on a California shore — for the second time in just three months. The roughly 10-foot-long dead oarfish — rumored to be a sign of impending earthquakes — was found stretched out on the rocky shoreline of Grandview Beach in Encinitas by UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography last week.

The proximity of these strandings has reignited discussions about the oarfish's mythical reputation as a predictor of natural disasters.