100 PLUS SILKY SHARKS ON A BAITBALL

People often ask me about sharks… What’s it like to swim with sharks? Am I afraid of them? Why risk it? I try my best to answer, but always fail to adequately convey the magic of the encounter, the feelings, the thoughts going through my head. They are most impressive creatures, masters of their realm, a perfect blend of capability and beauty. 400 million years of fine-tuning under the hood.

While on my recent trip to Mexico’s Socorro Islands, I photographed a number of different shark species, including whitetip reef sharks, Galapagos sharks, silvertip sharks, whale sharks, scalloped hammerheads, and silky sharks. One of the highlights of the shoot was finding a baitball out in open water, a swirling tornado of baitfish. Small hapless fish which happened to be under attack by at least one hundred silky sharks. One of those Blue Planet moments I’m lucky to stumble across a few times in my career.

Here's a video clip from my few moments in the water, before the silkies became a bit too frisky and forced me to call it day. Still images will be posted to my web site ( www.brandoncole.com ) soon.