YouTube / Megan Brasen
A family fishing for snapper in New South Wales, Australia was treated to a once-in-a-lifetime encounter when a humpback whale took the line. The family was fishing off Kingscliff when all hell broke loose in a matter of seconds, and they went full ‘strayan and the kids started swearing up a storm:
Despite spending a large chunk of my life in, on, and around the water, I’ve never been fortunate enough to see a Humpback whale up close. Such are the pitfalls of growing up in Florida. We can go fishing/swimming/boating year round but we’re stuck with bottlenose dolphins, sea turtles, and sea cows. I’ve been hearing about whales in the Gulf of Mexico my entire life but at this point, I’m calling bullshit because I’ve still yet to see a single one of them out there swimming around in the wild.
There’s not a rod-and-reel setup on the planet that is capable of hauling in a humpback whale, obviously. All the family could do was hold onto the rod until the line snapped. Based on seeing how the whale reacts in this video and the response from the fishermen, I really do think that whale knew that it’d somehow become tangled in fishing line, and I find that pretty surprising given how massive the humpback whales are and how minuscule the fishing line is in comparison.
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According to Grind TV, the fishermen thought they were fishing close enough to shore that whales wouldn’t ever be a concern.