A great white shark (Carcharodon carcharias) has put in a rare appearance around Nusa Penida, a large island located off the southeast coast of Bali.
The large and heavily scarred shark was spotted at the dive site known as Pura Ped, on Penida’s northern shore – famous for its extensive coral reef and strong, drift diving currents.
Encountering a great white is extremely rare for the area, although not the first documented sighting, as a great white was spotted in September 2019 at the popular Crystal Bay, on the other side of Nusa Penida and more usually known for sightings of the Southern mola (Mola alexandrini).
The shark was filmed by Swedish divemaster Fabian Clinton, who was diving with Scuba Junkie Penida when the encounter happened. Clinton described the encounter as ‘One in a million… getting close to the greatest!’
Also in the group was Sarah Taylor, a divemaster from the UK who was celebrating her 500th dive when the encounter happened.
‘The whole encounter was just amazing, unbelievable,’ said Taylor, ‘there are no other words to describe it!
‘Seeing something in the blue, a shadow that none of us knew what it was (we thought it was a whale shark!) but when we did realise we very quickly skipped back – what a great dive, a once-in-a-lifetime experience!’
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In a live-streamed interview with Scuba Junkie Penida’s Danielle Drury following the release of the video, Shark Guardian co-founder Brendon Sing said that although the encounter was unusual, it must be remembered that great white sharks are a cosmopolitan species, and present in oceans throughout the world.
‘It’s really hard to tell where this one has come from, but this area where they’re swimming through, it’s possibly something they’ve been doing for hundreds of thousands of years already,’ he said, ‘and it’s only now that we’re diving with our GoPros that we have photographic evidence of their presence.
‘Don’t forget, we’re probably missing 70 to 80 per cent of the day when we dive at these places, and the sharks are only there for a short time, so we’re only getting this small snapshot of what’s actually happening. Any time you go into the ocean, there are sharks nearby.’
Needless to say, the video has attracted a lot of comments asking if there was any danger from the shark, which has an undeserved reputation as a man-eating sea monster, and what action divers should take if they happen to encounter one.
‘Don’t swim away,’ said Sing. ‘Stay close to the reef, stand your ground, face the shark and keep eye contact with it – Once they realise you’re not swimming away they will lose interest and leave.’
For more about Shark Guardian visit www.sharkguardian.org; and to learn more about Scuba Junkie Penida and diving the ‘Nusa Islands’, visit scubajunkiepenida.com
The post Great white shark makes rare Nusa Penida appearance appeared first on DIVE Magazine.
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