Adrenaline took over for a Waitati man when he came face to face with a 4m great white shark off Karitane on Sunday afternoon.<\/p>\n
Tom Brough was out spear fishing, about 50m off Huriawa Peninsula, when he was shocked by what came round the corner.<\/p>\n
“It was just normal spear fishing, just sort of in an area where I\u2019ve gone many times \u2014 pretty safe, sheltered, kind of calm place usually,” he said.<\/p>\n
He had caught a couple of fish and had just fired his last shot when a 4m-long great white shark came up behind him.<\/p>\n
“He came to face me and basically just went for the fish.<\/p>\n
“I sort of realised what it was after and kind of pushed the fish at him and he took it and then kind of bolted with my speargun.”<\/p>\n
The shark then disappeared but was quickly back for some more tucker \u2014 this time swallowing one of Dr Brough\u2019s fins.<\/p>\n
“He came back around, and I was kind of swimming backwards with my eyes on him pretty hard and he just came back for another look. I kicked out towards him with my fin to kind of, basically push him off, because it was getting pretty close.<\/p>\n
“And then it took a chomp on my fin and tore that off.<\/p>\n
“It was touching distance. I mean, it grabbed my fin off my foot, so that\u2019s basically pretty much as close as you can get without it taking a part of you. Centimetres, probably.<\/p>\n
“Thankfully, I managed to keep it a little bit rational and not panic and just put my back to the coast and backtrack towards the coast and keep keeping my eyes on it.” Adrenaline took over.<\/p>\n
The shark did not like the taste of the fin and headed off to Dr Brough\u2019s catch bag, holding a couple of fish and floating off a rock.<\/p>\n
With the shark away collecting the bag, Dr Brough swiftly made it to land.<\/p>\n
“I remember sitting on that rock just going, \u2018Holy hell, that was close\u2019. Understanding, realising what would have happened if it had been a worst-case scenario \u2014 it would have been pretty awful.<\/p>\n
“Obviously, it wasn\u2019t trying to go for me. It wasn\u2019t an attack. It was just an encounter and him coming past and grabbing the fish.”<\/p>\n
Dr Brough, who is a marine scientist and works for Earth Sciences NZ, was 100% certain it was a great white.<\/p>\n
“It was the biggest shark I\u2019d ever seen and I\u2019ve seen some big ones in the water, a lot of species. I would say probably about 4m in there. Just really big, really wide, too. A lot of body to them. Big pectoral fins and big tall dorsal\u00a0fins.”<\/p>\n
He said the experience had not put him off and he was back in his kayak yesterday and was looking forward to going for a surf.<\/p>\n
“Yeah, they\u2019re beautiful animals, and, you know, it\u2019s me being in its environment. You take that risk sometimes, and it all came out all right.”<\/p>\n
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