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Location: Sulu Sea, The Philippines
There is something unique about terror when you're twenty
metres under water in the middle of an ocean. The feeling
of being trapped seems somehow more intense. Couple that with
the knowledge hovering at the edge of your consciousness that
at some point you just have to expose yourself to whatever
it is that's scared you and go up for air.
Five days of diving surveys recording fish on the coral reefs
of the Sulu Sea and there hadn't been a whiff of the
larger predators we expected and hoped for. Andre, my dive
buddy, had told me that I would see plenty of sharks here,
lemon sharks, blacktips, grey reef sharks, maybe even the
odd silver tip if I was lucky, or, he grinned, very unlucky.
Silver tips are known for their over developed sense of curiosity
and aggression, he informed me with a smile. "You mean
they bite" I grinned back.
We stopped at the last site of the day, a deep sloping sandy
bank scattered with coral patches. In we jumped clutching
writing slates and tape measures.
Fifteen minutes into the fish census with Andre five metres
ahead of me, a movement caught my eye. Curiosity getting the
better of me, I nipped over the top of a coral patch to investigate.
An enormous triggerfish was busy making its nest. Fascinated
at its intense labours I got a little too close. The triggerfish
turned in a flash and came torpedoing towards my chest. Frantically
back peddling and causing, no doubt, a hell of a racket underwater,
I turned away from my assailant. It decided I had been seen
off, well and truly, and resumed its work. Then, as I turned,
relieved at my lucky escape, I found myself face to face with
a two metre silvertip shark that had ambled over to investigate
the commotion.
To use the cliché 'my heart was in my mouth' would
be about right. I was suddenly and unexpectedly at the mercy
of a very dangerous wild animal indeed and way out of my depth,
literally, in every way. I was stunned for a moment, unsure
what to do. It didn't look aggressive, I decided, but then
I knew little about shark behaviour. But I did know about
dog behaviour, and the memory of facing a snarling dog was
all I had to go on. I could hear a voice telling me not to
look it in the eye, look confident, make no sudden movements
and don't turn your back on it. I looked up hoping Andre had
turned around. He hadn't and remained oblivious to the drama
unfolding behind him. I moved slowly back to the tape measure,
retrieved my writing slate from the rock I had jammed it under
and continued the fish count, keeping an eye on my new, and
unwanted, dive buddy.
Now this is when the 20m of water on top of me seemed to
make the terror worse. I knew that I just had to go up at
some point in the next twenty minutes, and in doing so would
leave myself completely vulnerable to attack. Predictably
the Jaws theme began playing and replaying in my head with
the volume cranked up. I'm not sure which was louder, my heart,
my breathing or the New York Philharmonics rendition of the
sinister melody now firmly jammed in my skull.
The shark disappeared momentarily and I suffered a wave of
panic that I now had no idea where it had gone. It appeared
suddenly to my left around a metre or so away, watching me
intently. Again it disappeared. I closed my eyes taking deep
steady breaths to calm myself. Think "confident"
I told myself, think, "don't mess with me pal".
I looked behind slowly. No, not there, nor to my left or right.
I looked in front towards Andre and there was the shark almost
sitting on the census line. Still not appearing aggressive,
but definitely curious, it moved closer just an inch and turned
side on to me as if weighing me up for a lunchtime snack.
I wondered how long it would take for curiosity to get the
better of it and found myself bizarrely assessing which limb
I could afford to lose if it decided a swift bite was in order.
Still Andre had his back to me. I finished the census, without
recording one fish and reached Andre's side. Relieved to have
the safety of another next to me, I gave the sign to ascend
to the surface. The shark hovered to my left for a moment
then appeared to suddenly lose all interest and glided effortlessly
down into the darkness. My heart was still pounding as we
ascended, and I strained to look below, expecting a set of
sharp teeth to appear at any moment.
As we reached the surface and the safety of the boat, Andre
asked chirpily, "good dive?" I clamoured onto the
boat, breathless. He continued, "shame we didn't see
any sharks, though,". |
Travel Writers: Shark Encounter by Sarah
Curran
