Was sailing with Greenroom & WINDY MILLER yesterday just north of Hilarys. Miller & I both saw a shark. After comparing notes on what we saw and a bit of research it seems to have been a white pointer!

The dorsal fin was 40-50cm and the shark looked big! Are there any experts who can convert that to full-shark length?

At the time it didn't worry us - figuring it was a reef shark or something - and we continued sailing, trying new stuff and falling in etc. In hindsight we probably should have headed straight back to the beach!!

Its the ones you dont see that cause the problems.

Did you see the report on 60 minutes tonight?
Great whites stick their head out of water to suss out the area and plan of attack
Thats why those parasites with kites buggered off so quickly. I thought it was because they got stuff all waves because we were out

Leech.
How far out were you? I was at Pinnarro Pt and thought I saw somthing "fin like" but figured it was just the paranoid heebies getting to me, looking into the sun and all.

If all white pointers where made to drag buoys, they would certainly be easier to spot!

Leech said...

The dorsal fin was 40-50cm and the shark looked big! Are there any experts who can convert that to full-shark length?

Far from being an expert, but I've seen a few whilst fishing.

The biggest I've seen up close (and I mean close!!! my wife gave it a pat when it came up next to our boat!) was approx 5m long, and its fin would've been around 60cms.....so I'm guessing somewhere between 3.5m - 4.5m long?!?

As PR said, the ones you see, you generally don't have to worry about, the sharks are smart hunters, and prefer to 'ambush' any fast prey, although the inquisitive ones are just as deadly, they'll 'mouth' you to find out what you are, then swim away casually.....unfortunately, this can be fatal.

I must admit, I'm not overly scared of sharks....but have enough respect to let them have the right of way....the same with road trains!

In the last few days there has been 3 (different) reports on the metro sa coast of 5 metre whiteys, chewing on fishing boat motors and circling and eye balling the boats. Its just that time of year.

It was around this time last year that 6 metre GW was hanging around Safety Bay.

might give it a miss, for a week or two...or go out when dave is practising his moves

thinking about it, the guy fishing in the tinny upwind , probably wasn't doing us any favours if he was chucking burley in.

Yep Panda, that is within 50m of where I was sailing with you and Mal a few weeks back.

The report said that the life guards were thankful it all happened on a day when not too many people were at the beach, it was windy and a bit cold...hmmm

aus301 said...

Yep Panda, that is within 50m of where I was sailing with you and Mal a few weeks back.

The report said that the life guards were thankful it all happened on a day when not too many people were at the beach, it was windy and a bit cold...hmmm

Yep, I sailed there quite a bit last year, too. I'd start at Broadbeach and end up at Mermaid...and I fell off all the time, sometimes 1km out!!

I remember one time Mal whacked his face on the boom and got a nosebleed. He said there was a big cloud of blood in the water, so instead of waterstarting, he uphauled and headed for the beach. Sometimes it pays to be paranoid...

I'm not sure balancing gingerly while you uphaul is going to help any when they ram you.

It's a shame they don't have arms and fingers to check you out, which is all they are doing when they have a "taste".

So now my equipment list now reads:

helmet
impact vest
harness
booties
knife
spear gun
first aid kit
plasma
flare guns
Roy Schnieder

Did it resemble any of these ........there are some good shots on here sorry about the langauge

By the way there always there best you can do is just watch the sunrise sunset business as thats feeding time for the big buggers.

www.jostimages.com/galerie/sharks/great-white-shark-fin.html

that pic is at my local beach, but here is the thing, I was more spooked in the muddy dark water up at Shearwater, its a pretty darn big area to fall off in the ocean and the odds of seeing a shark are quite slim, just get those gybes right is the best solution, and make the water starts super snappy if you cant, but, lets look at how many kiters are in the miami to the spit stretch of the goldy, dangling in the water for a lot longer than us, never heard of anything suss happening.

Clearly if we were part of this animals food source you would not be able to step in the ocean, heap so f people swimming everyday.

Flat water boys you can have your muddy warter with the bull sharks, not my cup of tea that is where I reckon the risk is.

We all surfed out the front at Mermaid the last few days nev er felt like i was at risk any more than any other day.

The sharks are known to be following the whales and feeding on the week and feeble, if we get in their path, well that is going to hurt a bit!

Thats my 2 cents worth.

more incentive to make the gybe.

notice the guys in the background with surfboards under their arms!