At first glance, it looks like Florida kayaker Captain Ben Chancey is fishing for sharks, but he isn’t. The fisherman just had a moment of really bad luck.
Chancey was actually grouper fishing three miles off the Florida coast. Before his brush with death, the kayaker spent a while trying to reel in a particularly large one when the fish broke free of the line, the Bradenton Herald reported.
Unfortunately for him, there was a shark swimming nearby — a whole group of bull sharks, actually — just aching to get a bite of his bait once it was finally free. One chomped onto the free treat as if waiting in line.
The bull shark was an estimated eight-and-a-half feet long and 350-pounds, and Chancey’s kayak is only 14 feet long.
Thus began a brief but terrifying battle between kayaker and shark . Captain Ben later told the New York Daily News that he “didn’t want him to get the best of me. I wanted to win.”
Nature wasn’t exactly on his side for this battle, however. But only a few seconds in, as the shark pulled hard on his line and the fisherman yanked back on his end, it flipped over his kayak, sending the man right into shark-infested waters.
With all the news coming out of the Carolinas about record-breaking shark attacks , this was a dangerous conclusion to the kayaker’s tussle. Luckily, there was a larger boat nearby, and he went for it.
“There were 10 big bull sharks swimming around. So I knew that there were other bull sharks swimming around.”
It was likely the fastest swim of his life, but he managed to get to safety quickly and before the predator could take a bite out of him, WESH reported. In the video, someone whoops and hollers in relief as the kayaker climbs onto the boat.
Ben said he wasn’t too worried during the exchange, because he’s never fallen out of his kayak before and sharks aren’t known to attack boats or other watercraft. And his friends’ relief was brief — it quickly lapsed into bravado once they knew their friend was safe, the kayaker said.
“Once they saw that I was OK, they were like, ‘Hey, jump back in! Let’s catch it!’ “
[Photo Courtesy YouTube Screengrab]
