3rd Place Coldwater
Nigel Motyer
“Basking Shark Mating Aggregation“
The Story: This summer we had an unusual spell of easterly winds which calmed the North Atlantic off the west coast of Ireland. We’d heard rumours from local fishermen of Basking sharks being sighted off the coast here so we headed off early to see if we could fund any, almost as soon as we got to the area and stopped the boat we could see fins. Jumping into the water we were greeted with huge groups, up to 30 animals, of these 35 foot long sharks. We were able to swim with several groups of these amazing animals for the full day. The sharks completely ignored us, seemingly focused on these mating carousals where they followed each other nose to tail in several large spiriling aggregations. The sharks stayed around for two weeks but then one day they were gone, likely sinking down into deeper water as the weather returned to a more typical westerly wind. A rare privilege to see something so seldom seem or photographed.
Location: Co Clare coast, Ireland
Equipment Used: Panasonic GH5, Nauticam Housing, Nauticam WWL 1 Wet Lens
Camera Settings: F5, 1/200 sec, ISO 400
