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Massive 18-Foot-Long Great White Shark Charges Surfer Off California Coast

By Dustin Wicksell
Published on: 12:54 PST, Mar 10, 2015

A group of surfers experienced a harrowing encounter with a massive great white shark off the California coast earlier this week, watching as the giant predator seemingly charged directly at them.

The startling incident took place at Marina State Beach on Monday, according to KSBW, when a small group entered the ocean to take advantage of the waves. Wes Williams, one of the surfers, had finished his last wave and was paddling back to shore when he spotted the giant white shark, which was charging toward one of the others in his group.

After several heart stopping seconds, Williams and his compatriots realized that the great white was actually after an unlucky seal, which just happened to be near them. The group watched as the great white stalked and preyed upon the seal, eventually consuming the unfortunate animal a scant 15 yards from the shoreline.

Williams estimated that the white shark measured an astonishing 18-feet-long, making it a very large, mature specimen. Earlier this year, another white shark made headlines on the Pacific coast when a dead seal was found washed up along a beach in Washington state. As the Inquisitr previously reported, that particular white shark was also believed to have been 18-feet-long, as determined by the seal’s wounds. The similar size, large by the standards of a white shark, may indicate that the same predator was responsible for both incidents.

Despite its impressive size, however, the shark is hardly the first great white to be spotted off the California coastline recently. In late February, a paddleboarder in Dana Point Harbor spotted a juvenile great white swimming underneath his board, according to the Orange County Register. Stand-up paddler Arthur Grant described the shark as eight-feet-long, noting that it swam just four feet under his board.

“It got within about two feet of the nose on my paddleboard, then rolled to the left. I saw him perfectly.”

After swimming beneath Grant’s board, the white shark slowly circled him before eventually moving off, just a few feet below the surface. Making his way back to shore, Grant warned others in the water of the shark’s presence.

The sighting at Marina State Beach isn’t the first time a white shark has been spotted in the region, and some locals even believe one of the predators has taken up residence in the area. In 2011, a surfer was struck and mauled by a great white shark at the same beach, luckily surviving the ordeal.

[Image: Daniel Botelho via Twitter/@greensboro_nc]

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