Sunday 28 December 2008

Hobie kayakers meet Great White Shark

A group of Australian fishermen off Sydney were horrified to meet a Great White Shark whitch tipped one of them into the water and circled round ominously before pushing off - see this report on the BBC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7802226.stm.
Interestingly, the fishermen are in kayaks driven by the Hobie Mirage drive. It is a tribute to its speed and reliability that they were fishing so far out in such tiny boats. One of them says 'Do you see the size of that thing - it's bigger than my boat'.
And, being Aussies, the report is punctuated by a Morse code of bleeps - quite understandably, given the circumstances.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

"That far out" - no, they were only 2km from their launch spot. That location is regularly fished by guys in all manner of craft, including paddlers. As for reliability, I've not had any of the pedallers follow me out to deeper water.

Might also want to consider that the visibility at the time was very poor - it was foggy - and the vibrations of the mirage drive may have played a part in attracting the shark. Once the shark arrived in the area, it followed anyone who tried to pedal away

Chris Partridge said...

Many thanks for the information, though the idea that a Mirage drive might attract sharks is a bit alarming!