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Great white shark filmed DROWNING a 33ft humpback whale for the first time in ‘strategic kill’ off South Africa – Port Elizabeth in the News

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Great white shark filmed DROWNING a 33ft humpback whale for the first time in ‘strategic kill’ off South Africa: A GREAT white shark was filmed DROWNING a 33ft humpback whale for the first time in a “strategic kill” off South Africa. Drone footage captured the shark, known as Helen, hunting down …
Source: “Port Elizabeth” – BingNews.

The shark, reportedly named Helen, was filmed taking down the 10m whale over a period of about 50 minutes.

The whale was reportedly in ill health and was trapped in a discarded fishing rope when the attack took place off Port Elizabeth in February.

Keeping the whale’s blowhole underwater, Helen managed to finally drown it. Ryan said that the whale was not able to resurface after drowning.

‘Helen looked very informed about what she was doing, which made me curious about whether she was an experienced whale killer, was acting on instinct or on plain intelligence by detecting her prey was weak,’ observed Ryan.

While observing the whale, Ryan observed that it had mottled skin, or patches of red and purple skin, as the whale became separated from its pod or group of whales. Both were indicators of poor health which left it vulnerable to an attacker such as Helen.

This is the first time that an adult humpback whale had been attacked and killed by a great white shark. Usually, whales are able to ward off sharks using their powerful tails and killer whales tend to kill smaller shark species too.

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