A group of Western Australian sea kayakers has come face-to-face with a five-metre great white shark for the second time in four days.
The group rafted together for safety while the sea predator circled them for 15 minutes yesterday, as a rescue helicopter and nearby boats raced to help them.
Last night, they were pinching themselves that they lived to tell the tale – twice.
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After setting off yesterday morning from Hillarys Dog Beach in Perth’s north, about 10am, the monster approached and lurked beneath the surface.
Allen Halsy was the first to spot the apex predator approaching.
“I just looked out of the corner of my eye and I saw something and looked and the shark came in really fast and it’s fin was out of the water and it was going straight to the back of their boat,” he told greatinsports.com.
The same kayaking club was out paddling out on Saturday when an almost identical situation occurred, with a different great white circling them in a similar spot.
“It was a different one because this was a tagged shark and I think it was a little bit smaller as well and I just said ‘oh no, not again’,” fellow kayaker Richard Lailey told greatinsports.com.
Lailey said they didn’t really know what the shark’s intentions were.
“He carried on circling us and circling us and he swam under us a few times as well,” he said.
It’s an incredibly rare event many will never experience in a lifetime, let alone twice in four days.
“When you’re just sitting in those little flimsy kayaks out there, you’re really at very low water level [and] when that shark’s coming up, you could just about touch it,” Halsy said.
A shark warning was still in place for the state’s northern beaches last night from Scarborough to Ocean Reef.
There have been 11 tagged sharks and sightings between Ocean Reef and Waterman’s Bay since Saturday, with experts urging caution and warning that vessels such as kayaks offer little protection.
It’s not the first time in WA great whites have taken an interest in paddlers.
In 1997, Brian Sierakowski and John Hanrahan encountered a shark that attacked their surf ski off Cottesloe Beach.
Martin Kane’s water craft was torn apart in Mullaloo by a great white in 2012.
Yesterday’s kayakers said they were completely undeterred by the two close encounters and planned to get back on the water this weekend.
“These experiences come in threes, so I’ll see you down here at the weekend,” Lailey said.
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