A pair of paddleboarders raising money for charity had a frightening encounter with a hammerhead shark that circled them near Florida’s coast – and the entire incident was caught on video.
Gabriel Barajas and Malea Tribble were paddling from Florida to the Bahamas, an 80-mile journey, to raise money for cystic fibrosis awareness, WJZY reported.
And amid Barajas and Tribble’s travels, a hammerhead shark approached them.
“It just so happened that out in the middle of the Gulf Stream, 40 miles off the coast of Bimini, we got new fundraising help from a 5ft hammerhead shark,” Barajas told WJZY.
Tribble’s husband, who was accompanying the pair in a support boat, first spotted the shark behind Tribble.
Later, Tribble was ushered into the boat as the shark’s fin was seen trailing above the water, per video from Crossing for Cystic Fibrosis, the event’s organizers.
The shark then approached Barajas, who was still sitting on his paddle board, and began circling him.
“It was all over us. It was definitely behind her, and from the looks of it, its head had to have been underneath her board,” said Barajas to WJZY.
Hammerhead sharks have been spotted at other times in Florida’s water. During the Fourth of July weekend, beachgoers in the Perdido Key area frantically left the water after spotting hammerheads, WEAR TV reported.
But experts say that the appearance of hammerheads in Florida’s water is normal.
Dr Tristan Guttridge, a marine expert and founder of the conservation non-profit Saving the Blue, told the Guardian that the shark spotted by Barajas and Tribble was likely a younger great hammerhead, given its dorsal fin.
Hammerheads usually travel between the Bahamas and the US, occasionally surfacing for navigational reasons. Guttridge said the hammerhead was likely curious about the presence of the paddleboards.
“My guess is that this animal was inquisitive and it saw something novel in the environment,” Guttridge told the Guardian. “You’ve got to think about how this animal was viewing the object. He has no idea that there’s anyone on top of it. It’s looking at the silhouette of the board so it’s probably wondering what it is.”
Guttridge added that hammerheads have “no interest in us” whatsoever and are actually skittish around humans, given his experience with swimming the sharks.
“To my knowledge, there’s never been a bite on a human from a hammerhead. To me, they’d be one of the least dangerous large sharks out there,” said Guttridge, before offering some advice.
The best thing to do during an encounter is to exit the water, since most people can’t identify type of shark they could be swimming with.
“The best response is to very calmly walk out of the water and watch from the beach, and enjoy the moment of seeing what the sharks up to,” said Guttridge.
English (US)