20-foot-long ‘gentle giant’ stuns kayakers, paddleboarders in Scotland, videos show
Off the coast of Scotland, a “gentle giant” appeared. The 20-foot-long sea creature left kayakers and paddleboarders in awe — and prompted a warning from wildlife officials.
Ally Connell and his friend went out fishing in kayaks off the coast of Dunbar on Sept. 2, he told McClatchy News and wrote in a Facebook post. They were over a mile from the shore “when I noticed the big fin beside my friend’s kayak,” he said.
Connell recognized it immediately as a basking shark.
Basking sharks are “the world’s second largest fish,” according to NatureScot. A toothless shark, they eat ”plankton soup” by filtering large amounts of water through their gills to find plankton. This feeding, or “basking,” usually takes place near the surface.
The basking shark circled Connell’s kayak, “which I thought was amazing,” he said and photos show.
Connell wasn’t the only one amazed by the massive ocean animal. Jacob Allen heard of the shark’s presence and decided to paddleboard out to see it on Sept. 5, he wrote in a Facebook post.
Allen spotted the shark’s fin and approached, the post said. The “basking shark was soon lapping around me. … After its first lap, I slipped into the water to see if it would come round again,” Allen wrote.
Video footage shows the huge shark’s gaping mouth as it swims along. The shark passes near the camera and Allen’s paddleboard, the video shows.
“Despite knowing it’s a harmless basking shark, seeing a huge mouth and a 25ft shark in the dark water definitely got the adrenaline rushing!!” Allen wrote. “I had the most amazing wildlife encounter of my life.”
Ian Combe was also out on the water off the coast of Dunbar on Sept. 5, according to a Facebook post from the Royal National Lifeboat Institution in Dunbar. While fishing, Combe “had a close encounter” with the 20-foot-long shark, the organization said.
“I was sitting just off the cement works when it approached me,” Combe told the organization. “Seeing it up close, it was some size, bigger than my own boat, but such a gentle giant. I’ve only ever seen one here before and that was about 50 years ago.”
Video footage shows the shark swimming very close to Combe’s boat before turning away.
Drone footage shared by Andrew Smith on Facebook also shows the “beautiful, massive and fascinating creature.” Even without anything nearby to compare it with, the shark appears relatively large. It moves slowly just under the surface.
The East Lothian Council Countryside Rangers issued a warning to boaters about the basking shark on Sept. 5, according to a Facebook post. “We have been made aware that some paddleboarders and kayakers are getting far too close to it, even reaching out to touch it,” officials said.
Wildlife officials reminded people to keep their distance and not to swim or try to pet the shark, the post said.
Allen did not respond to McClatchy News’ request for comment on Sept. 7.
Dunbar is about 30 miles east of Edinburgh and about 365 miles northwest of London.
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