Species: Oceanic Whitetip Shark.
Location: Cat Island, Bahamas, 2017.
I was attracted by the reputation of the Oceanics – bold and feisty, not afraid to approach whatever or whomever happened to be in the water alongside them and they did not disappoint! However, despite some close passes, no sharks bumped my camera housing and no displays of aggression were observed.
This species curiosity combined with the fact that they are open ocean predators whereby they make the most of predation opportunities, have led to their notoriety in the water as the species thought to have predated on the victims of the sinking of the USS Indianapolis.
The hunters, however, have now become the hunted with the North West Atlantic population that I was diving with being classified as Critically Endangered by the IUCN. I thoroughly enjoyed my dives with the Oceanics and I hope effective management of this species will allow stocks to recover in the near future.