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Mantas swim by putting their tips up in the air. Sometimes they almost touch. The coloring is consistent with the underside of a manta. I don’t know of any shark with white fins with gray edging. Also, it looked like the little girl had something in her hand. Some posters were saying a squid.
Note to self: don’t carry fish food into the water if you don’t want a close encounter with fish!
Great points. The swishing motion the taller "fin" on the left makes seems more like a shark's tail than a ray's fin. But who knows? The video is so short, it's hard to really tell. The thing she has in her hand seems more telling than anything. If that was a squid, aka fish bait, then it might have easily been a shark. Glad she wasn't hurt, but it also shows how larger sealife can be easily hidden in such shallow water.
Dave
I spent a good portion of my young life surfing in north San Diego. The closest encounter I ever had was a dolphin popping up next to me but you can bet I squeezed pretty hard when I first saw that fin! I never have any doubts when I’m in the water that those scary creatures are all around me. I am comforted by the fact that I’m not food.
I spent a lot of my younger years doing the same, including five teenage years in Hawaii. I remember being "circled" by a shark off Waikiki one time while I was snorkeling. The shark wasn't threatening, just curious, I think. It was about twenty feet away when I first noticed it. Didn't matter to me what it had in mind - I swam toward shore, about as fast as my fins would take me, and the shark decided I wasn't interesting enough to follow. Fine by me.
While living in San Diego for ten of my Navy years, I heard something I've never forgotten: "If you've been swimming in the waters off Southern California beaches and have never seen a shark, you can rest assured at least one has seen you." Ackk!!
Dave