(CNN)There are countless creatures on Earth that man has yet to discover.
Two Hawaii scientists believe they've come across one of them, and it's a jaw-dropping wonder.
A "minivan-sized" sea sponge was discovered deep in the ocean near Hawaii, according to findings published this week in the scientific journal Marine Biodiversity.
Scientists aboard the NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer spotted the massive sea creature at a depth of 7,000 feet within the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, a protected U.S. National Monument spanning 140,000 square miles of ocean, during a month-long expedition from July to August of 2015.
A remote device typically used for deep sea exploration stumbled upon the mass. The scientists were on a ship on the ocean's surface and had to keep panning out of a remote video feed in order to figure out what they were looking at.
