Giant salmon school lures sharks, swimmers into close quarters

Swimmers explored an immense school of salmon Friday off Australia’s Bondi Beach, unaware that they were dangerously close to sharks.

Swimmers explored an immense school of salmon Friday off Australia’s Bondi Beach, unaware that they were dangerously close to sharks.

The accompanying footage, shared by Drone Shark App, opens with two swimmers several yards from the salmon, and what’s described as a grey nurse shark at the school’s edge.

Another scene shows a nurse shark and swimmer parting the salmon as they swim, each creating a green circle, blocked from each other’s view by the tightly grouped salmon.

“Co-existing with sharks and salmon schools. Not a good idea,” says the Drone Shark App commentator, who provides amusing commentary throughout the 3:39 clip. (The commentator declined to reveal his identity.)

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At 1:56, several distance swimmers enter the picture and begin to pass near or over one of the sharks. “Norman, there’s a huge school of humans coming,” the commentator says, apparently having named the shark Norman. “Look out!”

Two swimmers pass directly over the shark but do not seem to spot the predator.

The nurse sharks are not fazed by the presence of people, seemingly interested only in the salmon. But schooling salmon might also attract great white sharks, as Drone Shark App implies in its video description:

“Guys, I recommend do not swim in the salmon schools and swim on the beach side if you can as I’ve seen the more dangerous sharks approach from the outside on many occasions.”

On this morning, Drone Shark App did not spot any larger sharks. But the group did capture footage of stingrays, dolphins and seals foraging within and around the salmon.

–Images courtesy of Drone Shark App