{"id":243985,"date":"2026-04-23T23:36:16","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T23:36:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/243985\/"},"modified":"2026-04-23T23:36:16","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T23:36:16","slug":"family-catches-releases-10-foot-great-white-shark-in-florida","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/243985\/","title":{"rendered":"Family catches, releases 10-foot Great White Shark in Florida"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">SARASOTA, Fla. (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mysuncoast.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.mysuncoast.com\/\">WWSB<\/a>) &#8211; A Massachusetts family on a fishing charter Monday morning caught and released a 10-foot great white shark about a mile off the coast of Fort Lauderdale.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Donovan Smith and his father Judd, from Redding, Massachusetts, reeled in the shark during a charter through Fishing Headquarters.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cI got in the chair first and tuckered me out, so my dad had to come in and I finished it out,\u201d Donovan Smith said. \u201cBut my arms were super tired and it was a crazy fight. It was probably the craziest moment I\u2019ve ever had.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The family did not know what they had hooked until they began reeling it in.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cWe didn\u2019t know what we had until we were reeling in and it took forever to reel in. It was huge,\u201d Donovan Smith said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Captain Mate Logan Graf said it was his first encounter with a great white shark.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.mysuncoast.com\/2026\/03\/09\/tagged-white-shark-bella-tracked-off-floridas-gulf-coast-near-sarasota\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.mysuncoast.com\/2026\/03\/09\/tagged-white-shark-bella-tracked-off-floridas-gulf-coast-near-sarasota\/\">Tagged white shark Bella tracked off Florida\u2019s Gulf Coast near Sarasota<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cIt was absolutely amazing. I\u2019ve been fishing here for seven years and I\u2019ve never caught one before,\u201d Graf said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Captain Paul Pellucci said he has caught six great white sharks since 2003.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cWe know that they\u2019re present off of our coasts, especially in the cooler months of the year,\u201d Pellucci said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Catherine McDonald, a shark research and conservation program director at the University of Miami, said great whites generally do not like shallow water, so beach goers should not be concerned.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cSo the data is showing that white sharks are increasing in numbers off the east coast of the United States and Canada,\u201d McDonald said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s a great sign for population recovery overall.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">McDonald said the increase is partly due to greater awareness.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cBut we\u2019re not necessarily seeing more so much as noticing them more,\u201d McDonald said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Great white sharks are a protected species, requiring catch and release.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 WWSB. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SARASOTA, Fla. (WWSB) &#8211; A Massachusetts family on a fishing charter Monday morning caught and released a 10-foot&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":243986,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[249,107535,251,250,52803,107537,107536,107538],"class_list":["post-243985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-fishing","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news","tag-great-white-shark","tag-protected-shark-species","tag-shark-catch-florida","tag-shark-population-recovery"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=243985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243985\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/243986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=243985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=243985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=243985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}