Stunning Video: Surfer Nearly Swallowed by Humpback Whale
- Posted on November 4, 2011 at 6:07pm by
Madeleine Morgenstern
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A California surfer must have had the surprise of her life when she was paddling over to two kayakers barely a quarter-mile from the beach — and narrowly avoided being swallowed by a humpback whale:
Video of the amazing near-miss has gone viral since its posting on YouTube Wednesday, garnering nearly a half-million views.
Some have questioned its veracity but Barb Roettger, who captured the whole thing, insists its the real deal. She told the San Jose Mercury News she was just out with a friend in a kayak, taking pictures with a regular — non-waterproof — camera and had it recording when the two (yes, two) massive creatures suddenly surfaced.
The video was posted with the following description:
A woman floating on a surfboard near Santa Cruz, California almost ended up on the lunch menu for a humpback whale over the weekend. Barb Roettger had her camera rolling as two hefty whales popped out of the calm waters not far from the unsuspecting surfer and a pair of kayakers.
A pod of humpback whales has been hanging out off the Santa Cruz coast, noshing on anchovies that flock to the area to feed on plankton. The woman found herself in the middle of a feeding frenzy called lunge feeding, which occurs when whales herd anchovies and shoot straight up out of the water with their mouth wide open to catch the fish.
The whales have had quite a few dangerous close encounters with humans and boats in recent months. Whale watchers are warned to stay at least 100 yards away from the feeding area. Roettger says she has now gained a greater respect for whales, their feeding patterns and will now only spectate from the decidedly safer dry land.
“I will never be going out there ever again to purposefully watch them,” Roettger told the News. “It just got so out of hand it wasn’t fair to the whales.”
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Comments (113)
Ghandi was a Republican
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 9:54amShe was in more danger of being pecked by the seagulls.
Report Post »ishka4me
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 10:52amI am an avid whitewater kayaker, spending over 150 days a year on the rivers of New England and from time to time we do some ocean kayaking. A few years ago outside of Ogunquit Maine we spotted some pilot whales and decided to paddle close to view them better. As we neared them at about 100 feet away we quickly came to a conclusion that it may not be a good idea. The whales although not aggressive and not knowing anything of whale behavior could react in way to eliminate a threat or an accidental bump could cause a dangerous situation. We were several miles from land and no shore was visible. I believe that viewing them from a distance is good enough. Not worth dying over.
Report Post »sooner12
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 11:22amWow
Report Post »Detroit paperboy
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 12:12pmI prefer fresh water lakes, that way i remain at the TOP of the food chain….
Report Post »Opinionmonger
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 12:14pmAt least it diverts attention from thing that DO matter , doesn’t it?
Report Post »eric6161
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 12:33pmI believe that if the whale had wanted to “gobble” her up (s)he would have done so. IMHO… this mammal needed to come up for air… got it and dove again… never thinking that the news media would get upset over two mammals sharing the same air. Once again the news media reporting the interesting but non-important news of the month.
Report Post »mils
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 1:00pmi would have peed my pants…wow..what an encounter
Report Post »vtxphantom
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 1:57pmWould have been a better story if the whale had swallowed her. Try swimming with the sharks next time!
Report Post »KickinBack
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 3:16pmThe gulls cracked me up. “Mine! Mine! MineMineMine!”
Report Post »WhiteNoise
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 3:36pmCome on Blaze. Please don’t hype the headlines. I come here for “the truth” and want to spend my limited news reading time consuming important and interesting content. To hype this obvious moment where the whales surfaced relatively close to some people while feeding into a story about a person almost being swallowed is insulting and not appreciated.
Please do better.
Report Post »corbecket
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 5:09pmThe guys at The Blaze are starting to get silly. Humpbacks are filter feeders. Their esophagus isn’t nearly big enough to swallow anyone.
They should stick to social and political issues where they have some credibility. If this keeps up I may put them into the yellow journalist category.
“Surfer nearly swallowed..”. Humph!!!
Report Post »UrsaMajor
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 7:33pmWAAA! I want to do nothing but read, think, talk and dream about politics 24 hours a day, 7 days a week! I don’t want to be informed or entertained by anything else! I say that I am a free-minded conservative but only want to live my entire existence around politics like a good little progressive! CATER ONLY TO ME! VALIDATE ONLY ME! WAAAAAAA!!!!
Report Post »Sheepdog911
Posted on November 6, 2011 at 8:44amThe woman was no where near where the whale breeched. The whale is in the foreground and she’s in the center. This woman was in as much danger of having one of the buildings in the background collapse on her as she was of being swallowed by the whale.
Report Post »Pigpen
Posted on November 6, 2011 at 12:36pm@ISKA4ME You know, I am glad that you are such a great outdoorsperson, but approaching marine mammals is a federal crime under the The Marine Mammals Protection Act. But I doubt that the Feds will come hunt you down after your post like they went after the Texas duckhunter who inadvertently revealed that he had violated the Migratory Birds Act when he posted on Facebook his recent hunting trip. And since you said you are from the Maine area, it is also relevant to mention that a while back Maine wanted to start taxing small watercraft. BUT apparently only bass boats and fishing tubes counted, not your hippy kayaks. Funny how the culture war cookie crumbles, isn’t it?
PS Go ahead and block this post too, BLAZE STAFF. Prove to me that you too are just another set of ELITISTS out to control what information gets fed to the HERD!
Report Post »Pigpen
Posted on November 6, 2011 at 12:59pmThis surfer has publicly admitted that she knowingly approached these marine mammals. So unless she has a federal PERMIT, she has just publicly admitted that she has VIOLATED the Marine Mammal Protection Act! So why isn’t she facing JAIL TIME like the Louisiana teen who was cited “after he posted photos on Facebook from a recent duck hunting trip” see here:
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/louisiana-teen-could-face-jail-time-after-posting-duck-hunting-photos-on-facebook/
Where is the OUTRAGE at the INJUSTICE here? Why does the Hippy-Chick get to break Federal Wildlife Laws with IMPUNITY but the Louisiana ******* goes to JAIL?
Report Post »Phoenixsoulfire
Posted on November 7, 2011 at 8:07amthose whales feed on planktin. You know like the little green guy on sponge bob square pants show? You can tell they were still about 20 feet away from them she wasn’t in danger.
On rare occasion whales will swipe people with their tales. (divers) when they get to close. They don’t go out of their way to attack or eat people. It is a nice story just not a very good title.
Report Post »Calamity Jane
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 9:46amI thought I was reading the National Enquirer for a second.
C’mon, Blaze! This surfer was in no danger of being swallowed by the whale….Not even close! ….Whales are not capable of swallowing a human. These whales were feeding, most likely, on anchovies near Seabright Beach near Santa Cruz.
The whales are closer to shore than normal for their feeding before migrating further south. Being so close to shore has created somewhat of circus atmosphere with humans trying to get “up close and personal” with these big critters.
Report Post »Edward
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 3:03pmAgreed.. Its obvious the whale was feeding and the swimmers were just close by. A brown your pants type of moment for sure but the woman wasn’t in any danger at all.
Report Post »Xyskalla
Posted on November 7, 2011 at 8:26am“Not even close” is right. The whale came up between the camera and the kayaks, but the surfer was on the far side of the kayaks. The whale came closer to eating the kayakers than the surfer (and even then, it didn’t look close), but nobody would believe that a whale ate two kayakers.
Report Post »DeVain
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 9:30amI read the title and thought it was going to be a story about Barney Frank…………
Report Post »Trebuchet
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 9:30amWhale to his Pod buddies; “Hey fellers watch this”.
Report Post »oneshiner
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 7:28pmHey, didn’t Jonah ride around in a whale?
Report Post »LOJ
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 8:45amOh my Gosh, This was Awesome..What magnificent creatures….At first I couldn’t see that the woman had made it to the boat…Could have been Jonah all over again…Of course Jonah prayed to the Lord after he was swallowed by the Whale, because Jonah had disobeyed the Lord by not going to Nineveh to preach against its wickedness, and the Lord caused the Whale to spew Jonah out on the beach and give him another chance!
Report Post »robert
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 8:59amIf I‘ve told them once I’ve told them a thousand times: That’s not a hump back whale. It’s fatty Janet Napolitano taking her morning dip.
Report Post »elihu
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 10:20amOf course, Jonah never was swallowed by a whale; read it again: it was “a great fish”.
Report Post »MaxineH20Sux
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 8:45amI think they knew it was there. The last video showed a guy in a kayak following a whale round in CA. i wonder if it is the same guy?
Report Post »churchill1945
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 8:04amIt really doesn’t matter how close the humpback was to the surfer…..HUMPBACK WHALES DON’T HAVE ANY TEETH, AND THEIR THROAT IS SO SMALL THAT THEY WOULD CHOKE TRYING TO SWALLOW A BIRD….but, cool video anyway.
Report Post »V-MAN MACE
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 8:22amI was thinking the same thing, the most danger she was in was getting crushed or dragged under with the undertow of the whale…
…and what the heck was those seagulls doing? They looked like some stupid Muppet seagulls from PBS or something…. eating too much plastic or something…
Report Post »capecodsully
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 1:17pmV MACE – The seagulls were watching their dinner coming up to the surface, that’s a clue to the dummy humans that whales are feeding in the area.
Report Post »churchill1945
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 3:35pmWhen humpbacks surface like that they were likely feeding, and generally have a mouth full of food. When they close their mouth some of the food spills out…the gulls follow and clean up whatever winds up in the water.
Report Post »UrsaMajor
Posted on November 6, 2011 at 10:16amIt‘s the same as if you’re at the shore. If you see gulls and other sea birds flying around the surface it means one of two things: sharks are in the shallows, which can seriuosly ruin your day… or dolphins are in the shallows, which can also seriously ruin your day!
Report Post »V-MAN MACE
Posted on November 6, 2011 at 10:17amI feel stupid now because I already knew that…
Shucks.
Report Post »sbynyc
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 7:50amClearly, the girl on the surfboard and the kayackers were nowhere near the whale(s) as there was no ripple effect to them from the disturbance in the water caused by the whale(s).
Report Post »gmoneytx
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 7:34amYou freaking idiots, she wasn’t even close to “nearly swallowed” well I’ll never get that 10 seconds of my life back…
Report Post »Lone Ranger
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 7:06amA trick of perspective. The whale was nowhere near the surfer. It’s like taking a picture of a small boy holding a pony in the palm of his hand.
Report Post »000degrees
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 7:20amGood call Ranger…still would be impressive to see from where they were sitting…..
Report Post »READRIGHTHERE
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 3:03pmThe point is, the whales could have surfaced closer to the kayak and the surfer just as easily as they did 10 yards away. In that sense it was very much a near miss, and the word “almost” certainly applies. Having said that, there is nothing cooler than seeing a whale in such close proximity. Amazing experience, luckily it did not get dangerous.
Report Post »4xeverything
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 7:04amHumpback whales use hard fiberous hairs to strain krill, plankton and very small fish into their mouths. They don’t hunt warm blooded animals let alone open their mouths to take bites out of anything. This is highschool biology 101.
Report Post »ontheclock247
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 7:55amLearned this in Alaska. This is bubble net feeding and they can‘t and don’t swallow humans.
Report Post »ontheclock247
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 7:57amOh, and the amount of gulls should have been a dead giveaway that the whales were around herding fish to begin their bubble net feed.
Report Post »BJAlexandria
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 6:41amLooks fake to me in that the whale looked much closer to the camera than the girl on the surfboard. Also, no waves/surf. Looked like she’s in a bay somewhere. And, like some else said, no voice of shock or surprise.
Report Post »Notsureishoulddothis
Posted on November 7, 2011 at 1:20pm1) Santa Cruz *is* a bay 2) the lady who took the film stated in a phone interview that she was using a zoom lens. This would make her look closer than she was.
People went out specifically to get close to the whales because, well, they’re stupid.
The girl on the surfboard sure did make a zippy move paddling over to the kayakers to put them between her and the whale tho’. That was pretty funny.
Report Post »Busdriver4u
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 6:35am“It’s just not fair to the whales” Oh my it could give them indigestion or something. Then we would have half eaten anchovies all over the place. Better to stay home and whale watch on the tube. PBS anyone?
Report Post »BlueStarMom
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 6:34amI don‘t think it’s fake. I’ve been whale watching and seen whales break right next to a boat. They don’t splash unless they are trying to. As for the people not reacting, the whole reason they were out there was to see the whales do that. They expected it. Look at the wake, and the birds. Her statement was lame, though. It’s not fair to the whales? What is a surfboard and a kayak to two whales? Toothpicks?
Report Post »Notsureishoulddothis
Posted on November 7, 2011 at 1:23pmWell said!
Report Post »tomasreal
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 6:34amwhere is the surf
Report Post »Tom
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 3:37amI say fake only because the were no reactions by anybody. I would have at least let out a holy ___k!
Report Post »Notsureishoulddothis
Posted on November 7, 2011 at 1:26pmThere were reactions – listen for the bleep in the video, and watch the surfer girl paddle over to put the kayakers between her and the whale …
Report Post »Thevoice
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 1:52amWith everything odd that takes place today . .(like parks full of encampment people)…(genius Goldman sacks executives stealing money and going broke)..I sure thought she be swallowed …
Report Post »SgtB
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 1:27amI wonder is Santa Cruz’s new crime monitoring and prevention unit could have predicted this incident?
In case you didn’t know, Santa Cruz is trying to implement a “pre-crime” system like in minority report.
Report Post »http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2011-10/santa-cruz-experiment#comment-124103
palerider54
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 12:59amMakes you stop and rethink the story about Jonah.
Report Post »ZAP
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 1:50amYes, the BIBLE stories are true.They are written to teach.
Report Post »c0mm0nsense
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 12:29amThat was disappointing.
Report Post »scoter
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 12:01amhttp://www.helpfireobama.com Please give $20.12
Report Post »David, the Constitutional Libertarian
Posted on November 4, 2011 at 11:59pmI was once in North America when Mt Saint Helens blew, it was also a near miss.
Report Post »ZaphodsPlanet
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 12:27amI was in Texas when Mt. Saint Helens blew….. I was even closer than you…. SCARY.
Sorry… but this is like totally lame. But it is a fine example of why I refuse to Kayak on the ocean(or anywhere really)….. I prefer my life as a human who doesn’t get mistaken for shark food. 25-30ft power boat is the smallest thing I’ll set foot on in the ocean.
Report Post »patriotmom1776
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 1:59amLOL, I get your point, the surfer was not almost swallowed, although it probably felt pretty darn up close and personal to her!
btw, I was across the river in Portland, OR when Mt. St. Helens blew….came out of church after feeling an earthquake and couldn’t figure out what all the smoke and ash were in the sky….it was very weird having ash rain down for days.
Report Post »oldschoolgreen
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 2:38amI win I was in Seattle when it blew.
Report Post »oldschoolgreen
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 2:42amUh my bad Portland is closer. You win.
Report Post »Mr.ManZ
Posted on November 4, 2011 at 11:51pmHello, this video did not show anyone nearly swallowed by a whale ! TheBlaze has became kind of desperate in their headlines.
Report Post »Cgeezy
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 1:53amHow much closer did this have to be to be a near miss for you? Id say thats about 20 feet closer than any of us are prepared to be to a feeding whale….
Report Post »CaptMorgan812
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 4:16amIf she had fallen off her board, then I personally would label that a close call. This video has proved to be a bitter disappointment indeed.
Report Post »ChristianConservative76
Posted on November 4, 2011 at 11:46pmKnowing personally what you can do with after-effects, I am having a hard time buying it. The way she talks and pans the camera without reaction seems to be setting the shot of for some motion tracking to attach the separate footage of the whales to. Could be real, but I don’t buy it.
Report Post »RepubliCorp
Posted on November 5, 2011 at 12:04amFake…….
Report Post »jordanreese for freedom
Posted on November 4, 2011 at 11:41pmwhat this
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