The basking shark is the world’s second biggest fish, after the whale shark. Basking sharks are threatened, in part due to the fact that boats strike them when the sharks come up to spend time near the surface area. Nevertheless, nobody’s ever seen a boat strike on a basking shark from the shark’s viewpoint– until now.
In fact, it’s possible that nobody’s ever seen video of a boat strike on any type of large marine animal from the animal’s perspective. At the time of the strike, this basking shark just took place to have a measurement gadget on it that can track the animal’s activity and record video.
Taylor Chapple, a shark scientist at Oregon State University’s Hatfield Marine Science Center and lead author of a study that explored the ramifications of this new data, told Phys.org: “This is the first ever direct observation of a ship strike on any marine megafauna that we’re aware of.”
Chapple states the boat struck the shark as it fed at the surface area of the water. After the crash, the shark appears to panic. “It instantly swam to the seafloor into deeper, offshore waters, a stark contrast to its habits prior to the strike,” Chapple discussed.
The 23-foot-long female basking shark retreated to deep waters after the incident, where the tag continued to collect data about her motions and habits until the tag self-released. Phys.org reports that these tags self-release after a pre-determined timeframe, so about 7 hours after the crash, scientists misplaced the shark.
See the accident and after-effects here:
Did the Basking Shark Make It Through?
Unfortunately, researchers don’t know for sure if this basking shark survived its accident with a boat. Around the time of the tracking tag’s self-release, the shark lived but hadn’t resumed “normal” behavior yet.
Ideally, scientists can use the data from this first-ever footage to better understand how ship strikes impact marine megafauna and how to avoid future strikes.
Header image courtesy of Greg Skomal/ NOAA Fisheries Service (Public Domain)
No one’s ever seen a boat strike a basking shark from the shark’s viewpoint, previously. Watch video footage from an electronic camera mounted on the shark.