Drone Operator Captures Great White Sharks Swimming Around People
A Southern California photographer has been gathering a lot of attention lately because of some incredible footage he was able to capture with his drone. Matt Larmand is a young up and coming photographer that specializes in landscape and ocean fine art photography. While he is just getting started professionally, he has accumulated an impressive portfolio featuring the beauty of his Southern California home. From stunning coastal views, to the crash of a wave, to wild sea birds, dolphins, whales, and sharks, Matt’s skill with his drone photos are obvious. But it is a video that he filmed earlier this month that has brought his work to national attention.
Matt often goes out to the beach with his Phantom 4 drone by drone giant DJI. This drone is known for being compact and easy to use while providing some of the most crystal clear high quality images. One of Matt’s favorite things to search out with his drone are the great white sharks that often cruise the Southern California coastline. Over the years Matt has spotted many great white sharks, but this year the numbers he personally has spotted seemed to have declined. So when his drone’s camera found several cruising along Capistrano State Beach in Dana Point around 12 in the afternoon he decided to stick with them.
After filming the sharks for a while something else popped up on his screen, a group of hydrofoil surfers. The surfers seemed to be having a great time towing each other across the water on a board tethered to a jet ski. Perhaps they noticed the drone and were showing off for it a bit, but what they didn’t notice was the fact that they were in the water only a frighteningly short distance away from the great white sharks. Being on shore and far out of earshot, there was no way for Matt to notify the surfers of the danger they were in. He said, “From what I could see the guys in the water had no idea that there were sharks in the water, let alone close to them. At least until the end of the video where the driver of the jet ski finally sees it and points it out.”
Matt estimates that one of the 3 sharks was about 8 feet long, marking it as a juvenile shark. Great white sharks are about 5 feet long at birth and grow a bit less than a foot each year. These smaller, younger sharks in the 6-8 foot range do pose less of a risk to humans as they approach the shoreline mostly out of curiosity and in search of warmer waters to bask in. Which could explain the behavior of the 3 sharks Matt witnessed that day. He said of the sharks, “It was almost like they could care less they were there. One of the clips I have, the guy being towed by the Jet Ski, they were going by and went past by six to seven feet away, and the shark could care less if they went right past him. The sharks were being really mellow.”
However, great white sharks are one of the only sharks known to attack humans unprovoked. So when Matt saw one of the surfers fall off of his board he was understandably worried. “I was freaking out. I was like, he has no idea there’s a shark right next to them. He was just sitting there, he had no clue. I would be freaking out if I was him, it was just insane to watch.” Luckily Matt was able to see the surfer quickly climb back onto his board as the shark seemed to have it’s curiosity stemmed and swam away.
Living along the California coastline you come to except that there is always a risk of having a shark encounter in the waters. Matt Larmand has been fortunate enough to capture these sharks safely from the shore with his drone. And for the group of surfers he filmed with the great white sharks, they had a pretty lucky day as well.
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