Surfers are somewhat accustomed to unexpected visitors in the lineup. A seal. A pod of dolphins. Maybe a sea turtle popping up for air in Hawaii.
But getting splashed by a great white shark? That’s a new one.
On Wednesday morning, October 28, a massive white shark cruised through the water near Pier Avenue in Oceano, San Luis Obispo County, coming almost unbelievably close to surfer Joel Hendrix. Check out the drone footage below.
Local drone pilot David Steiner captured the encounter from above. In the footage, the shark glides toward surfers before suddenly whipping around, flicking its powerful tail and sending a splash toward Hendrix. Then it swims away, leaving everyone unharmed.
“The shark just baptized me with a little splash,” Hendrix told the San Luis Obispo Tribune.
Not exactly the sort of blessing most surfers seek.
“I didn’t really have time to panic or be afraid,” Hendrix added. “It was like, OK, this is just not where I want to be anymore.”
The shark was estimated at 12 to 15 feet long—large enough to make the encounter considerably more unsettling than the average juvenile-white-shark sighting.
Steiner, who posts his aerial footage as @caveman_476, has been documenting California’s sharks for years. In an earlier Tribune interview about a separate close call near Pismo Beach, he admitted, “I was just trembling,” and marveled at “how long it takes people to even see one.”
His latest video arrives right in the thick of “Sharktober,” the nickname for fall’s seasonal return of adult white sharks to feeding grounds along the Central California coast.
Related: Woman Tries to Pet Great White Shark. It Doesn’t Go Well. (Video)
And the activity isn’t confined to San Luis Obispo County.
Earlier this month, Huntington Beach officials closed a stretch of water following a report of a 10-to-12-foot white shark displaying aggressive behavior. Farther north, Pacific Grove police advised against water activities at Lovers Point following shark sightings.
Dr. Chris Lowe, director of Cal State Long Beach’s Shark Lab, has explained that shifts in ocean temperature are helping move juvenile white sharks farther north. And mature sharks commonly visit Central Coast waters to feed on seals.
Still, shark sightings aren’t shark attacks. The Oceano encounter ended without injury, and the animal continued on its way.
Hendrix, meanwhile, has one hell of a story—and the world’s least conventional baptism.
Related: Great White Shark Photobombs Woman in Peak ‘Sharktober’ Off California (Video)
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