Massive sea creature with over 3,000 teeth seen in ‘rare’ Australia visit, video shows
Off the coast of Australia, an enormous sea creature with thousands of teeth approached a boat and surprised the anglers onboard. A video captured the “rare” visitor.
Thomas D’Emilio was fishing near K’gari island when his friend Toby began feeling seasick, D’Emilio told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. The pair went ashore for a while, then decided to try again.
”We saw some birds working some bait, so I went over to see if there were any fish with them,” D’Emilio told McClatchy News. “But there wasn’t anything. That’s when a fin came up.”
“When I first saw the whale shark, I couldn’t believe my eyes,” he said. “It was such an unexpected and amazing sight. I had to do a double take to make sure I wasn’t dreaming!”
D’Emilio posted a video of the “rare sighting” on TikTok on Feb. 6. (Warning: This video includes language that some viewers may find offensive.) The video shows the massive whale shark approach the boat and come close enough for the anglers to touch it.
“I just touched a whale shark,” D’Emilio said in the video.
The large white-spotted animal seems unfazed by the brief touch and the nearby boat.
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation shared a video of the encounter on Facebook. In it, the whale shark is seen slowly swimming around the boat.
Whale sharks are the largest fish in the world, “reaching up to 46 feet and nearly 24,000 pounds,” according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Despite their size and “more than 3,000 tiny teeth,” these sharks are filter feeders and considered harmless to humans.
Although whale sharks are common in some areas of Australia, they are rarely seen near K’gari, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported. The island’s last sighting was four years ago.
“Still can’t believe it,” D’Emilio wrote in the caption of the TikTok video.
“If (Toby) wasn’t feeling seasick we would have been out further and missed it all,” D’Emilio told the Australian Broadcasting Company.
K’gari, sometimes called Fraser Island, is an island off the northeast coast and about 590 miles northeast of Sydney.
UPDATE (02/12): The article was updated with comments from D’Emilio.
This story was originally published February 8, 2024 at 4:45 PM with the headline "Massive sea creature with over 3,000 teeth seen in ‘rare’ Australia visit, video shows."
