Does scuba bother humpback whales?

[sssss]

I've seen a few videos of whales recently and noticed that the film crews were freediving rather than wearing scuba gear. I thought that was a bit odd.

Today I saw this article:
BBC - Earth News - Epic humpback whale battle filmed (http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8318000/8318182.stm)

Besides some pretty amazing videos in the article, it says:
"Mr Munns had to freedive whilst holding his breath to get shots of the whales swimming past him at speed, as the use of scuba tanks would disturb the humpbacks."

Does anyone know about this? Is it the exhalation noise that bothers them?

[Lee Taylor]

I think scuba divers to whales, in some cases, are like mosquitoes to humans.

[HowardE]

Filming Whales, and going up and down continuously to get shots, is safer freediving, than bouncing up and down repetitively on Scuba.

I'm sure something could be said about bubbles scaring them? But at like 50x our size, I doubt they're afraid?

[jorge.a.mahauad]

Aside from the bounce dives, maybe a CCR would be more friendly...

I've seen a few videos of whales recently and noticed that the film crews were freediving rather than wearing scuba gear. I thought that was a bit odd.

Today I saw this article:
BBC - Earth News - Epic humpback whale battle filmed (http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8318000/8318182.stm)

Besides some pretty amazing videos in the article, it says:
"Mr Munns had to freedive whilst holding his breath to get shots of the whales swimming past him at speed, as the use of scuba tanks would disturb the humpbacks."

Does anyone know about this? Is it the exhalation noise that bothers them?

[halemano]

Aside from the bounce dives, maybe a CCR would be more friendly...

Especially in the case of a competition pod, only a freediver could keep up, at least for a couple minutes maybe. You could drop a CCR diver out in front of the path, but they often change course.