Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your
contribution is not tax-deductible.)
PayPal Acct: 
Feedback: 
Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):
| [ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, [3], 4 ] |
| Subject: Big Mako post 426lb speared off Coronado's | |
|
Author: Jim Day |
[
Next Thread |
Previous Thread |
Next Message |
Previous Message
]
Date Posted: 935978839PDT Saw this and thought I'd post it. Man kills attacking shark Diver uses spear gun on deadly fish off Coronado Island By Nina Kim STAFF WRITER August 29, 1999 Stewart Graham was calmly "paddy hopping" -- swimming from one kelp bed to the next -- just south of Coronado Island yesterday when he nearly met underwater disaster. Graham, 39, an environmental geologist, was free diving 30 feet down searching for yellowtail when he spotted the long, stout body of one of his favorite creatures -- a shark -- in the distance. He rose to the surface and calmly called to Danny Oliver, pilot of the Blue Job, the dive boat sitting 50 feet away, to bring the boat around. Graham told Oliver he was getting out of the water. Graham said he wasn't panicked or even frightened. An experienced free diver (they don't use air tanks), he has swum with sharks before, particularly along the Cocos Islands in the South Pacific. It had become routine in 27 years of diving, and no shark had ever attacked him. Why would this one, he thought. But when he dove under the surface again, he saw a large mako shark -- its mouth wide open and sharp teeth shining -- charging straight at him. With only a moment to think and the shark only about 15 feet away, Graham said, he grabbed the spear gun at his side -- loaded with a thin, 6-foot metal spear -- and aimed it at the fish's mouth. As the spear shot through the water, he said, the shark seemed to sense the danger and jerked its head to one side. The spear sank into the gills of the 10-foot-long animal, which then passed Graham without touching him. Meanwhile, on the boat, Oliver, also a geologist, said he was more stunned than his friend. "I thought: 'Oh, boy. What's going on?' I wasn't sure if we had a kill," said Oliver, who lives in Solana Beach. Graham said he doesn't know what prompted the shark to attack him except that makos are unpredictable. There was no blood in the water near him to lure the shark, he said. It took the team of four on the boat more than four hours to return to the Marlin Club on Shelter Island. The shark was too long and too heavy to put into the 18-foot Blue Job. They struggled with the dying fish for 20 miles, moving at a snail's pace, before docking late yesterday. A crane lifted the shark out of the water and onto a scale, where it weighed in at 426 pounds. "It's still hasn't sunk in. Maybe when I get home," said Graham, of Glendale. The four divers were participating in the San Diego Free Divers Blue Water Meet, an event held within the 40 miles of water surrounding Shelter Island. Graham said he was sorry he had to spear the enormous fish, even though it attacked him. "One of my favorite animals is the shark," he said. "As a geologist I have so much respect for them because they have been around for so many years." While members of his dive group were researching whether the shark could be a record for a fish caught with a spear, Graham and Oliver were looking for someone to fillet it while it was still fresh. "Shark meat's great," Graham said. "It's a little like swordfish." Copyright 1999 Union-Tribune Publishing Co. [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] |
| Subject | Author | Date |
| Big Mako II: Lucky Juanta and I't s 1000lb Mako | Jim Day | 935979281PDT |
|
||
|
Forum timezone: GMT-8 VF Version: 3.00b, ConfDB: Before posting please read our privacy policy. VoyForums(tm) is a Free Service from Voyager Info-Systems. Copyright © 1998-2019 Voyager Info-Systems. All Rights Reserved. |