When it comes to sharks, people often think of their sharp teeth and wide open jaws, as well as the ferocious shark attacks in many movies. In fact, there are many sharks that are quite peaceful and never actively hurt people. Whale sharks are one of the most typical species, they can not only swim with humans, but also allow humans to stroke.
Diver Rick Anderson, who used to live in Port Macquarie in New South Wales state, told The Epoch Times that there was a very special relationship between them: “In the past, I would visit it almost every week, but now since I have moved to live 5 hours away it has been about a year since I last visited it.”
Rick recently moved to the Gold Coast in Queensland.
Rick said: ‘I first met my Australian whale shark friend 11 years ago while teaching diving. While diving, I noticed a lot of newly hatched Australian whale sharks swimming around, they were only about 15cm long then, now they are 1.8 meters long.”
“I cautiously approached one of them to try to get it to swim onto my arm and it wasn’t long before I succeeded. Then I started patting it, and my students were amazed.”The strange thing is that as this whale shark grows older, it still recognizes Jack when he goes diving.
The 11-year miraculous friendship of an Australian diver and a shark
“When I went diving again in this area after a few weeks, months and even a year, this situation still happens often,” he said. “Every time I dive close to the reef, it will notice me and then swim up to me to pat and hug it.”
“Over the years we have gotten along so well, even if I hadn’t noticed it, it would circle around other divers to swim to my side, rubbing against my leg or shoulder until I Turn around and reach for it.”
Rick shared that Australian whale sharks are a type of seabed fish, they eat crustaceans and shellfish. This is an egg-laying shark, that is, the mother shark lays eggs in the sea, then uses her body to slowly push the eggs onto the reef, the shark eggs will hatch in the sea. They have barely changed since the time of the dinosaurs.
Over time, people have had great misunderstandings about sharks and they are described as “killers lurking in the ocean” through movies. However, the reality is that the relationship between humans and sharks is not that tense at all.
In the past, Rick has expressed that compared to the danger of sharks to humans, humans actually cause more harm to them. A 2018 research report found that every year, about 100 million sharks are killed by humans, and less than 10 people are killed by sharks.
This diving instructor recently recounted his “old friend” and posted a cute clip of them meeting again on the Ricks diving school Facebook page.He wrote: “My little friend, now I live in Gold coast, I really miss the days diving with it.”
Referring to his ‘animal friend’, Rick added: ‘It’s such a beautiful animal, I’m very happy to share with everyone our friendship and tell everyone that fish Fat people just want to live their lives, the same way people live their own lives.”
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