Some of the largest great white sharks ever tagged have been getting a lot of attention in the past few days from Florida to New Jersey.
Heading south, like a snowbird, Unama’ki, the second largest great white ever tagged by OCEARCH, the large marine animal research organization, was swimming along the Florida coast from Vero Beach to Key Largo. Unama’ki (pictured above) is 15 feet, 5 inches long, and weighs more than 2,000 pounds. The researchers think she may be heading for the Gulf of Mexico, where she spent much of last winter.
OCEARCH has tagged about two dozen great whites over the years. The electronic tags, which send a signal (a ping) to a satellite when the sharks surface, allow researchers to follow their movements.
Meanwhile, Katharine, a great white only slightly smaller than Unama’ki, surfaced again a few hundred miles off the coast of North Carolina last week. This was the first time she had been pinged in 18 months. Katharine (above) is 14 feet, 2 inches long, and weighs 2,300 pounds. She has kept her active satellite tag longer than any other great white. Scientists first tagged her seven years ago off Cape Cod. Five years ago, Katharine swam through Oregon Inlet and was tracked in Pamlico Sound.
And let’s not forget Nukumi, the largest of all great whites ever tagged and, at 50 years of age, also the oldest. Nukumi (above) is 17 feet, 2 inches long and weighing 3,541 pounds, was just pinged off the New Jersey coast, out by the deep submarine canyons. She had traveled 991 miles since OCEARCH tagged her on Oct. 2 off southern Nova Scotia. They called her the grandmother of all sharks, and say she could have given birth to as many as 100 shark pups. Read more:
https://www.wxii12.com/article/north-carolina-great-white-shark-reappears/34592657
https://www.app.com/story/news/local/animals/2020/11/08/ocearch-nukumi-great-white-shark-new-
