Scarey encounters!!

[wapyaly]

sealkie once bubbled...
Remember that scene in Jaws where the shark gets stuck in the cage and keeps thrashing until it destorys the cage ...

I was on the first dive of a 5 day liveaboard trip off Guadalupe island to observe white sharks - we were just doing a 30 min session in the cage to get familiar with the entry / exit procedure - no shark have ever been seen on the first dives - 20 mins after getting in a 12 - 14 ft female shows ups - gorgeous - cruising back and fore in front of the cages - what a rush - she lunges for the tuna head bait hanging next to our cage - and misses - but she does cut the rope and the tuna head floats freely directly in front of the cage - she turns and in 2 snaps the head is gone - great shots as she snaps head on to the cage - she keeps moving forward slowly and her snot pokes into the cage - the guy next to me jumps back ( as you would when a 12 ft shark is coming at you ! ) which catches her interest - so she moves a little futher forward with a short spurt of speed - as the cage opening closes on her she realizes she is trapped and starts to thrash = 4 divers pile one end of cage while she trashes the other in attempt to get free - 35 secs later shes out and away - we are left with half a cage !!!!

Have you done this again? Has it put you off?

 

[sealkie]

I havn`t done this trip again yet - I plan to Nov next year - but I did carry on diving the rest of that trip - it was awesome !

White Sharks are just gorgeous

 

[coliseum]

During a dive at some Lake in Florida (Grasshopper Lake?)

I was doing my Rescue Course... Panic Diver exercice... my instructor was pretending the panic... A snake, with a head as big as a football (American football), went out right in front of me from one whole and went into another... I beleive it was over 10ft....

I switched roles with my instructor and became the Panic Diver

 

[zeN||]

If you want to read some harrowing tales of shark encounters check out the Spearboard.com site, in reference to Fl and bull sharks Z

 

[Virgil]

holiday dive centres, obviously untrained divers who only get into the water once a year combined with largely uninterested dive centres make for the most dangerous dive situations i have come across.