The body of the apparently eyeless animal was found on a beach in Texas City a week ago.
Its most striking features are it wide mouth of terrifying razor-sharp teeth and elongated cylinder-shaped body.
The beast was found by Preeti Desai, a member of the US National Audobon Society conservation group.
She said: “On first glance it looked like something from the deep sea to me.
My initial thought was it might be a sea lamprey but when I got close I realised there was no way that was what it was, particularly based on the mouth.
“We squished it around a bit, and even turned it over but couldn’t come up with any other ideas.”
Ms Desai then posted the pictures on Twitter and asked biologists for help.
She said: “This is the kind of thing that’s perfect for Twitter – there are so many scientists and researchers on the platform and they’re very willing to jump in and figure out things like this.”
Biologists who responded suggested the sea monster was some type of eel but could not give a definitive answer.
The most popular opinion was that the animal was a fangtooth snake-eel, also known as the tusky eel, which is native to the Gulf of Mexico.
Tusky eels live in waters as deep as 300 feet but occasionally swim into the shallows.
They also have eyes, but they are small and could have decomposed by the time the creature’s body was found.
Dr Kenneth Tighe of the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History believes the dead creature is a tusky eel, but he said that it could also be in another eel family – either the garden or conger eels.
Hurricane Harvey smashed into Texas from the Gulf of Mexico three weeks ago and flooded Houston with a record-breaking 50 inches of rain.
The catastrophic storm killed 75 people and left more than 30,000 people homeless.
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