Here’s some good news on the great white shark front. Katharine, a 14’ 2”, 2,300-pound great white who once had a Twitter account with 61,000 followers and had not been heard from in about a year, just resurfaced about 200 miles of the coast of Virginia.
Researchers from Ocearch, the ocean and fish research organization, say that their satellite heard three pings a week ago from Katharine’s tracking device, which enabled them to establish her location. Katharine’s previous ping was on May 12, 2019.
Ocearch originally tagged Katharine in 2013 off Cape Cod. That’s when they measured her length and weight. She was not an adult then, and they think she has added at least 1,000 more pounds, making her one of the largest great whites on the east coast.
At the time, they named her after Katharine Lee Bates, who wrote the verses to “America the Beautiful.” And they gave her a Twitter account: “Misunderstood but sassy girl just tryin’ to get some fish.”
The shark’s tracker, slightly smaller than an iPhoneX, is attached to the dorsal fin and transmits to satellites when the shark breaks the surface of the water. The problem is that great whites can stay below the surface for months at a time. And marine life can grow on the tracker’s antenna and foul it.
But now Katharine has pinged off the Virginia coast in an area known as the Northwest Atlantic Shared Foraging Area, because great whites tend to linger there at times during the winter and early spring.
For its part, Ocearch posted on Katherine’s Twitter account that “it’s good to know she is still safe and out there visiting her favorite spots.” Read more.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/13/science/shark-katharine-found-twitter.html
