Highjumping Mako Shark?

[insideout]

Gday all, at smoko today ,a mate of mine who i have known for far to long, and is known for telling tall, tall stories, said that a friend of a friend( i thought, here we go!) used to work on a trawler overseas , and witnessed another deckie get taken by a jumping mako shark! Now i cant say i have ever heard of this before, yet i do know that the Mako shark can get a bad case of the grumps, but to actually line somebody up and take them out of the boat, I automatically thought this is B.S, but thought i would give him the benefit of the doubt, so , with the threat of being called a goose, id thought i would post it here, where i could get some answers.

cheers, Insideout

[Kendall249]

I have seen a photo in a fishing mag of a mako jumping clear out of the water (not great white), the ajoining article sait that it was estimated that at its size it had to be doing 65km/h for it to leave the water. There a doco on great whites that leave the water in pursuit of seals, but that is apparentely only seen at one location in the world. So it believable that sharks jump, but to line up a deckie on a trawler would be doubtful. Although stranger thing have happened.

[Poodroo]

Here is a cool link on the Mako sharks.

Poodroo

http://www.newenglandsharks.com/shortfin.htm

[moondancer]

There was a post earlier this week about makos - I added that a mate of mine tells a (true!!??) story of game fishing off Port Stephens and having a rather large mako free jump into the boat and commence to destroy the cockpit...so....maybe its possible as a freak event! Who knows...L

[Duyz72]

Strange things can happen, not sure if the link within the chat thread still works though

http://www.ausfish.com.au/forum/YaBB...28765347/10#10

[onerabbit]

Mako's are also called the "spinning shark" because they spin as they jump up to 30 ft out of the water, you guys can have that all alone.

Muzz

[DazSamFishing]

Sounds strange for a shark to pinpoint someone in a boat...

However, I went on a fishing charter off the GC a few years back and the deckie told me that when he worked down south they caught a mako... its initial jump was estimated to be 6 meters out of the water and when they got it close to the boat he reckons it jumped inside the boat and thrash around like crazy!

I certainly wouldn't want to have an encounter with one of those...

Daz

[jim_farrell]

There was a guy fishing with his wife in port phillip two years ago. I think he was in a 17-19 foot runabout. Mako hit him in the back of the head and nearly knocked him overboard.
I was of the belief that mako's jump clear regularly. I doubt one would line somebody up in a boat as a feed. May end up in a boat purely by accident.
Jim

[marlinqld]

Pass the bundy rum and happy cabbage please......some tall stories there maybe LOL....

[Big_Ren]

Is there anyway to verify this? It would have made news somewhere if in fact there is an element of truth to it. It is too quirky/freaky for any journo worth their salt to ignore!

[Glenn_Woods]

I was on a charter off Esperance WA about 97' and i hooked a mako while bottom bashing. One of the guys started taking photos and another videoed the fight. This mako jumped a total of 11 times clear of the water. I also heared that a Mr Rex Hunt ended up with a set of these Photos. Anyway, I'll post a photo when i resize it.

Woodsy

[Herm]

No doubt about sharks being able to jump out of the water ( deep water ) but to target a person in a boat ?????? I don't think so unless it was a freak of nature and just plain bad luck for the deckie IMO

Peter

[Great_White]

Oops didn't realise, Janine had looged me out

Peter.

[DazSamFishing]

I read a article in a fisho magazine not long ago and apparently a guy had caught a small trout... got it in and a spaniard leaped out of the water after the trout and struck the bloke in the neck... severing his throat...

I suppose you have to be bloody unlucky to have something like that happen and extremely unlucky to have a mako take you out!

Daz

[snelly1971]

I know of a experienced commercial fisherman here who had a Big Mako turn up to his boat...he reckoned it stalked him for two days...he would go out on deck and walk up the deck to have the shark follow him back and forth...but it never took notice of the 3 deckhands...only the skipper....it had him so freaked out...and this is one old salt hand, that he eventually shot it...I have heard the story several times and spoken to all crew members about there experience ...and by knowing the skipper for so long to be a truthful man ....that i must have to sort of believe his story...