Massive 30-foot basking shark stuns onlookers in Nova Scotia

A rare visit from one of the ocean’s largest fish turned heads in Nova Scotia over the weekend, as a basking shark estimated to be about 30 feet long cruised among boats and drew dozens of onlookers to the waterfront in Halifax’s Bedford Basin.

Video shared on social media Friday and Saturday showed the massive shark swimming near the surface, its dorsal and tail fins breaking the water as it moved through the northwestern end of the Halifax harbour.

The sighting quickly became the talk of the area, attracting spectators to the Bedford Basin Yacht Club in hopes of catching a glimpse of the giant fish.

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“As we were driving along the shoreline we saw a fin. I screamed ‘Shark!’ to the girls and we pulled over and we ran down to the dock to get a closer look,” said Christie Wisener, who witnessed the animal Friday evening.

Her daughter, Sydney Wisener, described the encounter as exciting. “It was splashing me. I was very excited to see it,” she told Global News.

David Hamilton, a member of the Bedford Basin Yacht Club, said he and his son went to the marina hoping to spot the shark after hearing reports about it. About 10 minutes after arriving, Hamilton said he noticed the animal’s large dorsal fin cutting through the water.

“All of a sudden we had 30 kids and adults at the end of the dock watching this shark swim around,” he said. “It was three or four feet away from us. It was pretty daunting to see something that large.”

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Hamilton said the shark spent time weaving among boats in the marina. “It had come right up and it was doing loops,” he said. “And then you just see the thing come by, and it was super ominous as it just cruised by. There’s the head, there’s the dorsal fin, there’s the tail.”

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Another witness, David Rankin, compared the animal to the famous shark from the movie Jaws. “The shark is so big-looking, like the mechanical shark in Jaws,” he said. “It almost seemed to want to play with us. It seemed like it knew we were there and kept coming in.”

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Despite its imposing size, experts say basking sharks pose no threat to humans.

“They’re a filter-feeder,” said Fred Whoriskey, a biology professor at Dalhousie University. “In many respects, you could consider them a gentle giant. There’s no reason to panic when you see one of these.”

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The basking shark is the second-largest fish in the world, reaching lengths of up to 12 metres. It feeds on plankton and is commonly found along Atlantic Canada’s coastline during the summer months.

Tonya Wimmer, co-executive director and conservation director with the Marine Animal Response Society, said the organization received a call about the shark through its incident reporting hotline on Friday.

While basking sharks are native to Atlantic Canadian waters, she said seeing one so deep inside Bedford Basin is exceptionally rare.

“We certainly do get reports of basking sharks around Nova Scotia and even in some coastal areas, but in the very back of the Bedford Basin? That was a new one for us,” Wimmer said.

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Whoriskey said it is uncommon to find a basking shark inside a harbour and suggested the animal may have entered the area while searching for food or had become disoriented in shallow waters.

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“My guess is that this is a very lost basking shark,” he said. “It somehow got itself into a constricted area and it is really confused and doesn’t know how to get out.”

Wimmer called the encounter a “pretty spectacular sight” and said it was encouraging to see people observing the shark from a safe distance. “It was great to see people were watching from shore, they were watching from the wharf and no one was in the water trying to approach,” she told Global News.

The Atlantic population of basking sharks has been listed as a species of special concern by the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada since 2009. Scientists say much remains unknown about the species, including where the sharks spend the winter after leaving coastal waters.

For many of the people who gathered along the basin this weekend, however, the encounter was simply a memorable reminder of the marine life found off Nova Scotia’s shores.

“It just made us really appreciate Nova Scotia and all that we have in this beautiful province and in our oceans here,” said Christie Wisener.