This video is hard to believe.  First of all this girl is surfing with no wetsuit in Santa Cruz.  Secondly, and mildly noticeable, is when two enormous Humpback whales’ mouths shoot out of the water, clamp down, and miss the surfer girl and a coupla kayakers by about, say, 15 feet.

What woulda happened if they’d have gotten chomped by the whales?  It woulda been bad.  I think they woulda spit ‘em out, but they’d have been in bad shape, spat out under water, & likely woulda been in no shape stay conscious nor breath air versus water.

Humpback bubble net hunting technique explaination

What were these Humpback whales doing?

They were feeding in their normal way.  Humpbacks locate schools of bait fish, blow bubble nets (fish are afraid of bubbles and won’t cross them), then ascend within the bubble nets forcing the fish towards the surface.  At the surface, the fish have no where else to go and the Humpbacks open their mouths, harvest as many fish as possible, and partially breach the surface as you seen in this video.

“A pod of humpback whales has been hanging out off the Santa Cruz coast, noshing on anchovies that flock to the area to feed on plankton. The woman found herself in the middle of a feeding frenzy called lunge feeding, which occurs when whales herd anchovies and shoot straight up out of the water with their mouth wide open to catch the fish.

The whales have had quite a few dangerous close encounters with humans and boats in recent months. Whale watchers are warned to stay at least 100 yards away from the feeding area. Roettger says she has now gained a greater respect for whales, their feeding patterns and will now only spectate from the decidedly safer dry land.”

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7 replies on “Surfer Almost Swallowed By Humpback Whale | Santa Cruz, CA”