Shark photo-bombs young Aussie surfer
A 10-year-old surfer has had a close encounter with a photo-bombing shark that shared a wave with him off an Australian beach.
Chris Hasson said Thursday he was taking photos of his son Eden riding a wave off Samurai Beach at Port Stephens, 180 kilometers north of Sydney, on Tuesday when something unexpected and indistinct caught his eye.
He discovered he had photographed the face of a twisting shark just below the surface with his son on an apparent collision course.
“I saw the second photo and (thought) no way,” Hasson said. “I quickly called him in and whistled. He (Eden) saw a shape in the wave and thought it was seaweed and felt something as he went over the top. ... He thought nothing of it until he saw the photo.”
Andrew Chin, a shark researcher at James Cook University, said the photographed shark was possibly a small great white, about 2.5 meters long.
“From the angle, it looks like the shark was spooked and is rolling away from the board to escape it,” he said. “There is no way that this is a hunting approach.”
Eden said he was glad he hadn’t seen the shark until he was safe on the beach and saw the photo.
“If I was on the wave and saw it, I probably would’ve freaked out and fell off,” Eden told Nine Network television on Thursday. “I was lucky I didn' t fall off.”