What does a sea wasp look like?

Answer 1

There are many creatures on this earth that are quite deadly to humans. The deadliest of all, of course, being other humans. Perhaps, what poses the greatest threat to our lives are creatures we can't even see - microbes. These are the microorganisms we usually call germs or cooties, the ones that make us sick. By and large, disease-causing germs are responsible for the largest number of human deaths every year. But what we're talking about here are the venomous creatures; those whose bodies manufacture toxins that can be rubbed off, ingested (swallowed), or injected into another, causing severe illness or death. Just to name a few, there's the poison dart frogs of the Costa Rican jungles, stonefish, cone shells, the black mamba snake, and even a tiny octopus that lives in tropical waters. When creatures are rated for the "deadliness factor" there's a couple of measures that are taken into account:

1) How many people an ounce of the creature's venom can kill

2) How long it takes you to die from the venom after being bitten, stung, or stuck

In both cases the grand prize winner and world-record holder is the creature known as the sea wasp, or marine stinger. The venom from a single creature can kill up to 60 adults! Over 100 people have been killed by the stings from a Chironex fleckeri and many more have been stung, but lived. Get stung badly enough by one and you could be dead within four minutes. The name sea wasp is misleading because the creature isn't actually a wasp or insect at all. It is a jellyfish. The "bell" of this box jelly can get as big as a Basketball with up to 60 tentacles hanging down as long as 15 feet, which is pretty good sized jelly. Not as big as the world-record jellyfish, though.

Answer 2

Sea wasps (Box jellyfish) can reach a diameter of about 12 inches (30 centimeters. They have as many as fifteen tentacles, and the tentacles can be as long as 98 feet (30 meters).