Diver Leaves GoPro Underwater to Record Sunrise — She Saw a World ‘Exploding With Life’ Instead

When diving into the fathomless depths of an ocean, one cannot expect anything less than an esoteric mystery or a treasure chest full of glittering jewels. Brittany Ziegler (@divedivelive), the 34-year-old scuba diver from Hawaii, didn’t just dive into the waters but also left her GoPro unattended in the secret depths to capture some glimpses of sunrise. But while the GoPro sat at the bottom, unbeknownst to the elusive species drooling around, it recorded “much more than just the Sun.” As the spying GoPro hid inside the fringing reef’s grasses, a marvellous world of magic materialized on the screen, with fascinating otherworldly creatures swirling all around like vegetables in a soup.

The only difference was that these creatures were alive and breathing. The footage of this world, shared by Ziegler, has amassed millions of views on TikTok.

"This is the side of the reef we don't get to see on our underwater live streams. The peace of dozens of species coexisting beautifully. The true magic of the underwater world," she wrote in the overlay text. The footage unfolds an expanse of azure water, with ribbon-like blades of seagrasses fluttering in the current and fizzing out bubbles, as if a bottle of champagne. Just after the humans who installed the camera had left, the GoPro received a bunch of “curious visitors.” 

Schools of squishy, colorful trumpet fishes glided over the sediment, which was not lit by the Sun peering within. Soon enough, some green sea turtles slither inside the picture to bask in the bright sunshine. As the waters turn iridescent by the gleaming sunlight, there’s an explosion of life in the form of golden mustard and purplish fish. There were sharks, too. “The rare magic of the underwater world,” Ziegler wrote, describing the magical ecosystem teeming with vibrant life. When she collected the camera and watched the footage when she got home, her “jaw dropped,” she described in the video caption.

In an interview with Newsweek, Ziegler revealed that this footage is part of a "behind the scenes" series they are currently running. “We live-stream the underwater world to share its beauty and foster a love and passion of the ocean. Most of our following stems from an audience that dives with us in real time. The Unattended GoPro series is a new thing we've started to capture all those moments we don't see on the live-stream with human interaction. We place a GoPro on the ocean floor and leave it recording by itself. The camera records for the entire dive while we are off on another location at the site,” she said.

People who watched the clip couldn’t resist but jump to the comments section to express their fascination with words like “breathtaking,” “captivating,” ”amazing,” and “precious.” “They’re like people busy going to work in the morning,” said @nia, likely referring to the school of fish that appeared in the video. @m.j2322 commented, “This reminds me of a screensaver we had back in the 90s.” @camicriscola shared, “This is the one underwater video that doesn’t cause me extreme anxiety; everything about this video was so relaxing.” @buffalochickenginger said comically, “Rush hour for the reef. They’re all just on their way to work in the morning!”

You can follow Brittany Ziegler (@divedivelive) on TikTok for breathtaking underwater videos.