Shark expert Ralph Collier remembers standing on a boat on the backside of Catalina a few years back, chatting with a fellow biologist as a group of kids paddled around on kayaks.
“One of these days, one of the kayakers is going to get hit,” he recalled saying.
Collier’s prediction was right. On Saturday, a Huntington Beach woman was knocked off her kayak just 500 yards from shore, a bump from a large shark that sent her flying into the water screaming while her family and other anglers watched helplessly from a boat.
Bettina Pereira survived the encounter with out a bite, and just sore muscles. When she flew into the air, Pereira actually stepped on the shark at one point, then pushed off in the opposite direction, her husband Andrew said in an interview Monday. Read that story here.
Collier, who runs the Shark Research Committee, contacted Andrew and confirmed it was a great white they encountered, based on the description and behavior of the shark.
“They’ve been at the island for millions of years,” Collier said. “So the fact that something has finally happened over there does not surprise me. I’m surprised it’s taken this long.” Collier said that it was an “investigation attack.”
“The shark was not interested at all in eating her, otherwise it would have stayed in the area and eaten her,” he said.
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Archive for the 'great white' Tag
Expert says kayaker encounter with great white was “investigation attack”
June 24th, 2008, 12:26 pm by Laylan Connelly, staff writerGreat whites off Newport Beach: photos from 2002
April 26th, 2008, 11:15 am by Laylan Connelly, staff writerCheck out these insane photos of great white sharks munching on a dead blue whale taken by Newport Beach lifeguard Brent Jacobsen in 2002.
As you’ve probably heard by now, a man was killed yesterday just south of Orange County in Solana Beach by a great white as he trained with a group of other swimmers for a triathlon.
First let me say – my deepest condolences to Dr. David Martin’s family. If you missed the story we wrote, check it out here.
There’s been a lot of talk lately about great whites off our shore here in Orange County. One guy from Manhattan Beach said his surfboard got nailed by one at Dog Beach in Huntington, and an expert confirmed that it was indeed a great white that bit into it. Read my interview with him here.
Lifeguards dismissed that claim as unverified.
Jacobsen said he was just a few feet from the shark as he snapped the photos. I would have been freaking out. Here’s how he described it:
” The most remarkable part of the experience was witnessing the shark’s speed. As we towed the whale carcass seaward, we would periodically stop to make sure the sharks followed. We would see the great white up to a quarter mile behind the whale, then in what seemed like only seconds it was hitting the whale. It did this through out the early evening. An almost full moon let us see the sharks after dark.”
These 2002 photos out of Newport show that they have indeed been out there – especially if we put out a meal for them. Big thanks to Sean Collins, chief forecaster of Surfline.com, for giving us a head’s up about the photos.
Here’s Jacobsen’s description of the photos you’re looking at:
“These pictures were taken in late August of 2002. The blue whale corpse was found at the Newport Harbor Sea buoy, located about 300 yards off the end of the West Jetty (The Wedge Jetty). Several sharks were eating the whale. The biggest was a great white that was over 15 feet long. The great white was between half and two thirds the length of the 30-foot lifeguard boat. We towed the whale corpse south, towards the 14-mile bank. At about 1 a.m. the whale was set adrift with several sharks still eating the corpse. The next day we found the whale with several sharks eating it. Video was taken. Eventually, the whale drifted to shore. We believe it is the same whale that was buried at San Onofre State Beach.”
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