Extraordinary drone footage recently captured a great white shark circling a swimmer off the coast of Santa Barbara, prompting observation from both the photographer and shark experts.
Carlos Gauna, who has been documenting sharks with his drone for about a decade on his YouTube channel, TheMalibuArtist, filmed the encounter on a recent Sunday. Gauna’s work frequently shows that sharks are around humans more often than many people realize, with most interactions remaining uneventful.
However, this particular video made Gauna nervous. He noted that normally, white sharks approach humans, recognize them, and then swim away. In this instance, the shark, believed by Gauna to be a roughly 9-foot juvenile, lingered within arm’s length of the swimmer, circling him multiple times.
“This one took a little longer to figure out that this was not food, or that it was a human, and that kind of made me a little uncomfortable,” Gauna said. He theorized that the turbid, muddy water, likely due to big surf, might have made it harder for the shark to distinguish the human from potential prey.
Gauna later found the swimmer on the beach and showed him the footage, capturing his reaction. The swimmer mentioned he had felt something moving in the water but had not actually seen the shark. He reportedly told Gauna, “I think about the sharks, and I think if I do die this way, at least I’ll be in my happy place.” The swimmer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Chris Lowe, director of the Shark Lab at Cal State Long Beach, reviewed the video and described the shark’s behavior as inquisitive, not aggressive or predatory. Lowe’s team has been studying how sharks use their senses to interpret their environment, including preliminary findings that the sounds people make while swimming could draw a shark closer from a distance.
Despite the close proximity, data compiled by researchers suggest sharks are innately able to determine what is food, and humans typically do not fit that profile. “Whether visibility is the key to how close they’ll get before they make that recognition, we just don’t know,” Lowe said.
This encounter comes as experts had predicted a “sharky summer” for Southern California. Record-high sea surface temperatures, influenced by a marine heat wave, El Niño, and broader climate change, have been observed. Ocean temperatures off Baja have exceeded 82 degrees, which is sending juvenile white sharks — who generally prefer waters between 67 and 73 degrees — northward toward the California coast, according to Lowe.
Researchers have tagged approximately 45 sharks so far this year, an increase from about 40 in all of last year, and the peak of the season may still be approaching. However, Lowe emphasized that people should not worry, as the vast majority of shark encounters do not result in bites. “Sharks know we’re people,” he said. “People aren’t food.”
Gauna hopes his videos serve an educational purpose, informing the public about coexisting with sharks. He articulated that when people enter the water, they are stepping into the sharks’ domain and should always maintain the utmost respect for their home.
