NEWCASTLE (AUSTRALIA)- A great white shark swimming in Lake Macquarie, north of Sydney, Australia, gave recreants quite the scare last week.
A grandfather and his 16-year-old grandson were drifting in their dinghy on the calm waters of the saltwater lake when the two-metre shark popped up alongside them.
The encounter was in shallow water, 80 metres from the Belmont 16ft Sailing Club. The shark followed them for minutes and kept coming back and swimming alongside of the boat.
Experts from the Sydney Aquarium confirmed the shark was a great white (Carcharodon carcharias) based on the anglers’ photos, who can be seen at the Newcastle Herald.
It’s really unusual to see this species inside a headland like Lake Macquarie. They are usually coastal/pelagic.
Lake Macquarie, Australia’s biggest salt water lake on the coast, is connected to the Tasman Sea by a small channel. Sharks are seen more often, although a great white in the lake is the first. Mostly bull sharks, tiger sharks and hammerhead are spotted in the lake.