Huge 18ft Shark Passes Within Inches Of A Bewildered Swimmer Off Coast
Sep 11, 2020 by apost team
After days of searching, a Scot encountered a basking shark while on a swim in Fladdabister, Shetland, UK in August of 2020.
Be sure to reach the end of this article to see the full video :-)
As reported on Mirror, Ryan Leith had spent days looking for a basking shark off the coast of the Shetland Islands in Scotland when he encountered two sharks close to the coastline at Fladdabiste. He posted the underwater footage on his YouTube channel on August 27th.
Leith had spent days scouring the Shetland Islands for basking sharks before he spotting the magnificent sea creatures.
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“I had just about given up when I saw not one, but two sharks just off the coastline at Fladdabister,” the 48-year-old told Mirror. “They were feeding on the abundant plankton that blooms in the sea around Shetland during the summer.
He added that he had stopped the boat and dropped its anchor. With that, he shared that "the shark seemed to be interested in the boat and swam towards it almost immediately. I took a lot of photos of it on the surface, and then, as it seemed quite relaxed, I went over the side with my snorkeling gear on," said Leith.
The moments that followed are caught on Leith's GoPro, showing the enormous creature passing within touching distance of him. The shark’s massive jaws were exposed and ready to chomp. Leith, who is a port controller for Lerwick Port Authority, estimated it to have been 18 feet long.
“It was great to be in the water with such a large and powerful animal," he enthused, adding, “The plankton it was feeding on limited the underwater visibility, so it would only appear out of the gloom when it was a few meters away from me."
According to Oceana, "the basking shark is the second-largest extant shark in the world, after the whale shark. A filter feeder, it’s usually seen close to the surface with its huge jaws open, filtering out plankton, very small fish, and invertebrates from the water."
Concluding his experience, Leith said: “In the past – the 1950s and 60s – they were hunted around Shetland by Norwegian fishermen for their livers, which contain large amounts of oil .. Thankfully now they are a protected species, and their numbers are increasing."
Have you ever been this close to a shark? How would you have reacted? Let us know in the comments and be sure to pass this along!