If you put your head underwater in the Bahamas, you might hear a chorus of crackling sounds – kind of like popping popcorn. This noise is enough to interfere with submarines and compete with whales to be some of the loudest sounds in the ocean, and yet, these pops are produced by the tiniest of creatures: snapping shrimp. Snapping shrimp are a kind of crustacean, and are about 2 inches (or 5 centimeters) long. They can live anywhere from the Atlantic Coast of the United States all the way down towards Brazil. They look like most shrimp, except for one huge claw that can grow to be half of their body length. Imagine if one of your hands was half of your size! This giant claw is what they use to make their signature snapping sound. To stun their prey, they snap their big pinchers together at lightning speed. That motion creates something called a “cavitation bubble.” These tiny bubbles can get as hot as the surface of the sun, and when they burst they produce a flash of light and of course, a Snap! You wouldn’t be able to see these bubbles without special equipment, but to the shrimp’s prey, it feels like an explosion. Besides hunting, it’s also thought that some shrimp snap to communicate with each other, defend their territory, and scare off their predators. With enough shrimp snapping away like this, anyone underwater can hear them! Snapping shrimp aren’t the only crustacean to use this kind of explosive hunting method. Mantis shrimp punch or spear their prey so fast that they too create cavitation bubbles with heat, light, and sound. Biologists and physicists both study these kinds of fascinating creatures.