Researcher swims with 30-foot shark as it feeds in Hawaii. See the video

A group of researchers were making their way inland after conducting field research off the coast of Hawaii when they spotted a group of birds hovering above the water.

The experts assumed the seabirds were monitoring a bait ball — which occurs when fish tightly pack into a swarm near the surface while they’re being pursued by predators below — so they went to investigate, according to a Nov. 7 news release from the University of Hawai’i.

One of the researchers, Mark Royer, who works with the Hawai’i Institute of Marine Biology’s Shark Research Lab, jumped in the water to get a better look at the underwater feeding, he said in the release. He was shocked to see a 30-foot whale shark.

“It is surprising,” Royer said in the release. “[Whale sharks] are here more often than we think, however they are probably hard to come across, because I didn’t see this animal until I hopped in the water.”

The massive creature was feeding on Hawaiian anchovy, known as nehu, a video and photo show. Other predators, including sandbar sharks and tuna were feeding on the nehu.

“While all the small nehu were being drawn to the surface from all the predators, the whale shark was coming in and using its massive mouth to come up to the surface, open it, and then the suction would cause all the fish to funnel into its huge mouth,” according to Royer.

Royer said the whale shark “would swim and approach” the researchers’ boat.

“That’s a behavior that whale sharks sometimes exhibit: if your boat is standing still in the water they [might] approach you. They’ve been known, both here in Hawaiʻi and other parts of the world, to do that,” he said in the release.

The creature was spotted about a mile off Kāneʻohe Bay, which is on the northeast coast of Oahu.

Whale sharks are the largest fish in the world — and the largest fish known to have existed on Earth, according to the Georgia Aquarium. They live in the Pacific Ocean, Indian Ocean and tropical Atlantic.

The massive filter-feeding creatures have unusually large mouths that can be up to 4 feet long, experts said. Although the sharks do not use their teeth to feed, they have about 300 rows of tiny teeth on each jaw.

The “gentle giants” are distinguishable by their white spots, which are unique to each individual, similar to human fingerprints, World Wildlife Fund experts said.

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