BBC presenter Simon Reeve has revealed he was wounded by a shark ‘the size of a bus’ and left with a huge scar on his leg in an ill-fated diving incident.
The documentary maker, 51, was filming off the coast of the island of New Guinea when he ‘foolishly’ jumped into the water with a whale shark.
However, upon jumping in, he says he crashed into the sea beast – the largest non-mammal on earth – which he likened to hitting ‘a ton of concrete.’
Fortunately for Reeve, whale sharks have no interest in eating humans. Instead, they eat tiny plankton and small fish.
But the creatures can grow up to an incredible 60 feet in length and weigh as much as 20 tonnes, and have skin that is six inches thick and incredibly hard – as Reeve discovered for himself.
BBC presenter Simon Reeve has revealed he was wounded by a shark ‘the size of a bus’ and left with a huge scar on his leg in an ill-fated diving incident
The documentary maker, 51, was filming off the coast of the island of New Guinea when he ‘foolishly’ jumped into the water with a whale shark (pictured) which he says he crashed into
Speaking to OK! magazine, the journalist said he thought the huge fish were cute and safe, ‘even if they were the size of a single-decker bus’.
As a result, he jumped into the water to swim with a shoal of sharks without fear.
‘I reckoned they would be soft and rubbery,’ he told the magazine, ‘but actually it was like being hit by a ton of concrete when one of them collided with me.
‘I suffered a very large scar across my leg and it could have been so much worse. I’d been an absolute fool for getting so close,’ he added.
Reeve is currently filming a new TV show about the world’s great remaining wildernesses, the first episode of which is set to air on Sunday.
In it, he visits Patagonia, the Kalahari Desert, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Pacific Ocean’s Coral Triangle, where he said he had the dangerous encounter with the whale shark.
‘It’s the most important series I have ever filmed because it’s about parts of the world so huge they help govern and shape our weather systems and climate and yet there’s a danger we might lose them,’ he said of the new show.
‘I drove down roads in the Congo in the almost certain knowledge that within a couple of years 20 kilometres either side would be cut down for profit.
‘Trees are the lungs of the planet, so for the sake of its future we have to find a way of stopping that happening.’
Whale Sharks are the largest fish in the world, and the largest non-mammal.
Speaking to OK! magazine, Reeve (pictured) said he thought the huge fish were cute and safe, ‘even if they were the size of a single-decker bus’ but quickly found out otherwise
Upon jumping in, he says he crashed into the sea beast – the largest non-mammal on earth (pictured, file photo) – which he likened to hitting ‘a ton of concrete’
They typically grow to 40 feet, but the the species have been known to grow even larger than that, with one being measured at a whopping 60 feet.
Despite their names, they are not whales, although like many of their fellow ocean-dwelling giants, they mainly eat plankton or small fish.
Scientists think less than 10 percent of whale sharks make it to adulthood, but those that do can live for over 100 years.
Data suggests that the population of whale sharks has declined by more than 50 percent over the last 75 years, and is listed as endangered.
