When marine biologist and photographer Dr Simon J Pierce caught wind of a two-metre blue shark (Prionace glauca) in New Zealand's Wellington Harbour, he had to check it out! The shark was spotted early Wednesday morning by a local café manager, but fear not, the stunningly sleek fish won't be stuck for long.
"It is trapped, at the moment," explains Pierce. "There's a three-metre deep tarp stretched around a section of the harbour that hosts a popular diving platform (not so many divers today, amazingly). The shark must have wandered in, then as the tide rose was unable to find its way out. The actual water depth is about eight metres though, so once the tide goes down again it'll most likely swim away without any problem."
The new swimming-hole inhabitant drew quite a crowd as adults and children gathered to watch the scene unfold. This was an amazing opportunity for the lucky onlookers: blue sharks are highly migratory, and have been tracked swimming over 9,000 kilometres (5,582 miles) at a time. We can only imagine where this one's headed next, but we're certainly glad to know it will be on its way soon.
UPDATE (10 APRIL, 07:10 EST): According to Radio New Zealand News, the shark has exited the harbour courtesy of some help from commercial diver, Murray Wilson, who jumped into the water just before 7pm to assist after the shark was unable to find its own way out.
"It didn't go with the tide and it didn't go with bait - it wasn't at all interested in that," Wilson explains. "So the next option was to try and scare it out just by jumping in the water, and that didn't work. So that left the final option to wrangle it out - which was to swim above it and hold onto it and actually guide it out."
According to the Department of Conservation the shark seemed to be in good health.
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Top header image: Jorge Hauser
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