The ‘Super Predator' of Great White Sharks Is…
As anyone who has watched Jaws knows, you do not mess with great white sharks. Not even giant, robot ones. They're simply too big, too fierce, and too mean. Okay, we're not exactly sure about the mean part. They might be nice dudes. But those teeth! We're guessing like one out of every five great whites is mean. With all that being common knowledge, it's especially troubling to hear that, a "mysterious animal" devoured a nine foot long great white off the shores of Australia. Though the "mystery" has been solved, it still isn't any better for those that prefer to not have nightmares: Apparently the great white was eaten by another, even bigger, great white.
The hunt for the mystery animal started when researchers noticed something odd happening with the nine footers tracking tag. The team of scientists had tagged the nine foot great white to monitor it, but were surprised to find the device on the shore a mere four months later. Going back to the lab, they looked at the device's data, and found that there was a sharp rise in temperature, from 46 degrees to 78 degrees, along with a drastic, 1,902 feet dive. The team's guess? The nine footer had been eaten by something much bigger, and the device was just showing that it was inside the big animal's stomach. Gross and scary!
The attack was so odd that it inspired a cinematographer, David Riggs, to search for the animal that did it. "When I was first told about the data that came back from the tag that was on the shark, I was absolutely blown away,” Riggs explained in his documentary, Hunt for The Super Predator. "The question that not only came to my mind but everyone’s mind who was involved was, ‘What did that?’ It was obviously eaten. What’s gonna eat a shark that big? What could kill a nine foot great white?" Riggs eventually answered his own questions. He and a team of experts set out and explored the area where the nine foot shark had regularly swam.
Almost immediately, they discovered their mystery animal. Using data from nearby sharks, they were able to locate another massive, killer great white. The big guy was estimated to be about 16 feet long and weigh over two tons. Less gross, still very scary. But why would this shark kill another? Turns out if sharks are hungry, they eat. It's as simple as that. "That cannibal thing is what great whites do," shark expert Hugh Edwards told Australia's Channel 7 News. "They'll eat anything, including their own kind." Please consider this your warning to never, ever, ever, go swimming in the ocean again.
[Image via Flickr - Allan Lee]
