Facing fear: Surf great Mick Fanning dives with great whites at Port Lincoln, five years after famously being buzzed by a shark in South Africa in 2015
When a great white buzzed Mick Fanning off the coast of South Africa in 2015 it left psychological scars, but also ignited a burning curiosity. Now he’s come to Port Lincoln to take a closer look at the creature that made him a household name.
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Three-time world surfing champion Mick Fanning is in good spirits.
He’s just proposed to his partner, and soon to be mother of his first child, Breeana Randall (she said yes).
He’s being paid by long-term partner Rip Curl to travel the world post-retirement, surfing perfect waves. Oh, and the brewery he started with a few mates from the pro tour has just been snapped up by beer giant CUB for millions.
In fact, the only thing that could possibly be playing on his mind as he works his way through a breakfast of a smoothie bowl, three pieces of toast, a banana and a black coffee at Port Lincoln’s Marina Hotel is the fact that he’s less than 24 hours away from coming face-to-face with a great white shark for the first time since his famous close encounter at Jeffreys Bay, South Africa, in 2015.
The attack came in the final of the J-Bay Open, a prestigious and long-running contest held at the revered point break. Fanning was surfing against fellow Aussie and good friend Julian Wilson when the huge shark came to the surface alongside the Gold Coast local, becoming entangled in his leg rope.
Fanning famously lashed out at the thrashing animal before disappearing behind a wave. For the next ten seconds the surfing world held its collective breath while it waited to see if one of the nation’s greatest ever wave-riders had been eaten alive on camera. You could almost hear the collective sigh of relief when Fanning climbed on to the back of the rescue jet ski unharmed.
In the post-heat interview, the surfer they call White Lightning was clearly – and understandably – rattled.
“Mate, I’m happy to never compete again,” he said.
“Seriously, to walk away from that … I’m just totally tripping out.”
Now, almost five years on, Fanning is set to get up close and personal with a great white again, but this time there’s a purpose. He’s the star of Save This Shark, a new two-part documentary set to air on National Geographic later this year.
The film, a follow up to Save This Rhino, which starred former English cricket captain Kevin Pietersen, will be directed by renowned surf filmmaker Taylor Steele and will see Fanning interacting with sharks off Port Lincoln, in the Bahamas and other locations in an attempt to get a better understanding of the creature that made him a household name.
Save This Shark will also look at how technology can help humans and sharks better coexist, and will feature input from a number of shark experts including Dr Charlie Huveneers from Flinders University.
As Fanning works his way through his admittedly large breakfast – “you never know when your next meal is gonna be,” he laughs – he’s philosophical about his close encounter with one of the ocean’s true apex predators.
“I don’t think it changed me as a person, but I think it made me appreciate things in my life a little more than I did,” Fanning says. “A big telltale sign for me is when I see people that I really care about I give them a big hug and make sure that they know I’m there. That’s my way of telling them that I know that they’re there.”
And one of those people he really cares about is Wilson, the bloke who ignored all of his survival instincts and paddle towards the shark to help his mate.
“It just shows the courage of the guy,” Fanning says.
“He’s a guy that I’ve loved since I first met him. What he did just shows what he is as a person – he’s extremely loyal. It’s pretty heartwarming when a friend does that.”
Directly after the incident Fanning says he was on an adrenaline high, and the fact that he’d narrowly escaped serious injury or death to quite a while to sink in. When it did hit home, it rocked him hard.
“I think when we first went in we were just so stoked, and then as time went on it just became more rattling,” he says. “For me, it took a good 40 minutes for it to all sink in – the adrenaline was just so high. It wasn’t until I saw the footage and saw how big the thing was … that just floored me actually.”
Fanning worked through his feelings by speaking to “a lot of good people, a lot of family and friends”, but he also had to deal with his sudden transformation from a well-known surfer to a legitimate celebrity.
Overnight he became the Aussie hero who punched out a shark. Except he didn’t.
“I pretty much just saw the guts of the shark, not its head,” he laughs. “When people say I punched out a shark they’re full of it. I was just punching to get away. I did little to nothing to that shark. When you’re next to a beast like that, you’re insignificant. It does what it wants.”
At the end of the day he’s philosophical about the whole incident, saying surfing happens “in their realm” and every surfers knows the risk they’re taking. However he admits that he might not be 100 per cent recovered.
“For me, this is a personal journey to find out if I’m totally healed or if I’m a bit spooked,” he says.
He’s had a good test run, diving with reef sharks, lemon sharks, bull sharks, hammerheads and tiger sharks in the Bahamas – cage free.
“It was truly incredible,” Fanning says. “I honestly didn’t feel scared one bit. I’ve always been wary of them, because I know how much power they have, but I’ve never been someone who thinks we should cull them all or anything.
“After my incident I found that it was hard to find out any information. I think that’s part of this project, just finding out the information that I couldn’t find.
“At the end of the day, I’m one of the lucky ones – I just came away with a few emotional scars. I consider myself extremely lucky.”
For filmmaker Taylor Steele, Save this Shark is a transition from above the waves to beneath.
The 47-year-old Californian cut his teeth making surf films, producing punk-rock scored high-action movies like Momentum and Focus that helped to introduce rising stars like Kelly Slater and Rob Machado to the world.
Later in his career he took on a more arty bent, winning accolades for films like Sipping Jetstreams and Shelter that captured a more spiritual side of surfing.
Now it’s animals that have been appearing in front of Steele’s lenses, directing Save This Rhino and, now, Save This Shark.
“We saw the huge success of what Kevin Pietersen did to bring new people into that space on Save This Rhino,” Steele says. “Having him be the everyday man and ask those questions that we all want to know, rather than just bombarding the viewer with facts and stats from an expert, really worked.
“We thought that recipe would be great in this space, and as a friend I knew there would be a huge emotional arc with Mick telling his story.
“I knew it was something he wanted to do, I just didn’t know if he was ready to do it at this time.” And one thing is guaranteed – if Fanning is in the water with sharks, Steele will be right there with him.
“Me and Mick have a deal – whatever he does, I have to do to,” Steele says.
“That’s caused some crazy adventures over the years, but it’s also why he trusts me. He knows I’d never put him in a situation that I wouldn’t get into myself.”
Fanning and his entourage saw a number of great whites on their trip, with the surfer commenting, “the more I see these things the more respect I have for these beautiful animals”.
After 60 years, Fox feels like message is getting through
AFTER Mick Fanning, Rodney Fox would have to be the most famous survivor of a great white encounter in Australia.
The 79-year-old South Australian made headlines when he was savagely mauled during a spearfishing contest at Aldinga in 1963.
The great white bit into Fox’s torso, puncturing internal organs and causing massive trauma and blood loss. It took 462 stitches to sew him back together.
Following the attack Fox became a great white expert, pioneering cage diving and helping directors capture images that ended up in hit films like Jaws.
Looking back, he has reservations about his role in creating movies that inspired a fear of sharks, and is happy that he’s now helping to make movies like Save This Shark.
“Hopefully this movie will summarise what I’ve been trying to say for the past 50 or 60 years,” Fox says.
“If you can educate people, show them the sharks, people are less afraid. When I was first bitten, there was a saying that the only good shark is a dead shark.
“People wanted to get rid of them all. I don’t think we have the right to kill off anything through fear, we have to learn to live with it.”
Fox says he takes great solace in watching the changing attitude towards sharks around the globe.
“It’s been awfully hard to get people to learn, but I was really pleased to see so many people standing up against the culling of sharks when they started in Western Australia.
“They were out in their thousands. I was really so proud. I felt a great relief. I’m really pleased that now, at almost 80 years old, to think that I don’t have to stand out their alone anymore.”
Not all happy with Fanning’s cage dive
WHILE Mick Fanning’s visit to Port Lincoln sent a ripple of excitement through the Eyre Peninsula city, not everyone was entirely happy with what he was there to do.
Some of the region’s surfers were upset that the former world champ would chose to dive with great whites, a practice some feel alters the behaviour of the sharks and makes interactions with humans more likely. Lifelong West Coast surfer Gerry Hemming, speaking on behalf of a number of local waveriders, said he believed that Fanning was unaware of the surfers’ sentiment.
“We think he was probably a bit uninformed, hence our disappointment,” Mr Hemming said.
“I guess a lot of people are a bit p….ed off that he would go down that path.”
Mr Hemming, 61, said most surfers were not against cage diving per se, but many had a problem with the use of burley to attract the sharks. Only two operators – Rodney Fox Shark Expeditions and Calypso Star Charters – are licenced to attract great whites using burley.
“Studies done by SARDI show that great whites will spend a higher percentage of time in the burley trail,” Mr Hemming said. “The studies show that berleying also increases the sharks’ ‘residing period’.
“That change of behaviour means that they’re not spending that time hunting, which means that when they leave the area they are energy depletedand more likely to exhibit aggressive and unnatural behaviour. The government has reduced the number of days that can they burley on, but we say that’s not good enough. We’re against anything that has the potential to change a shark’s behaviour or alter their swim patterns.”
Mr Hemming also said he believed that any research carried out into great whites should be conducted from independent boats. He said surfers accepted the fact that great whites were always going to be a risk.
“We’ve always surfed with sharks,” Mr Hemming said. “We’re just against anything that might change their behaviour.”