Huge Sharks in the deep!

Added: 2026-05-10

[00:00:01]There's a creature that lives in the ocean depths, rarely ever seen. That's a big fish. It is a little known species, but it could well be living right off Australia's biggest city. We're on a mission to find this elusive creature that feeds in the most unique way, but we might have bitten off more than we can chew.

[00:00:21]As we discover just how deadly they can be.

[00:00:26]And we encounter the biggest fish in the sea.

[00:00:32]Water covers 2/3 of our planet.

[00:00:35]It is home to a majority of life on Earth, from the majestic to the beautiful to the most feared.

[00:00:45]So, together with my family, it's [music] our mission to help unlock the secrets of our ocean, so we can better understand >> [music] >> and protect it for future generations.

[00:00:56]That's what everyone goes mad for, and we're doing it right across this country [music] of ours.

[00:01:03]Taking citizen science to a whole new level, we will be pushing the boundaries [music] like never before, and it's a race against time to ensure we have fish forever.

[00:01:22]The ocean deep [music] is the last frontier.

[00:01:25]We understand so little about it and are constantly discovering new [music] species as we explore ever further. As technology continues to improve, anglers are pushing the boundaries [music] more than ever before, and we are now encountering new species.

[00:01:42]The unknown intrigues me, and I want to catch these creatures of the deep. Not to kill them, but so we can help unlock the secrets of our ocean.

[00:01:52]It's our mission >> [music] >> as anglers to learn what is down there, so we can better understand and protect it for the future.

[00:02:00]We're starting this mission [music] off Sydney, and while these waters don't hold a lot of deep water structure to help concentrate the uglies, it does have the all-important East Australian Current, which sweeps past, so we can [music] catch literally anything. But there is one species that anglers are encountering [music] more as they go ever deeper.

[00:02:22]While in pursuit of swordfish for satellite tagging for season 1 of Fish Forever, we heard rumors of huge [music] threshers lurking in these waters.

[00:02:30]Tails of battles with unseen sea monsters lasting for hours with no chance of stopping them, and it's really inspired us to actually set out on this mission to see if there are, in fact, threshers in these waters.

[00:02:46]There are at least three species of thresher shark in Australian waters, the common, the pelagic, and the bigeye, [music] which are part of the mackerel shark family, which also includes the [music] mako shark.

[00:02:57]The common, which is a coastal species, is the most regularly encountered, while the pelagic and the rare bigeye thresher are found offshore.

[00:03:06]All three species of thresher shark are classed [music] as vulnerable under the International Union for the Conservation of Nature's Red List. Threshers feed in the most unique [music] way by whipping their tail to stun their prey, and it was something that was only recorded for the first time recently, which highlights how much we still need to learn about these vulnerable species.

[00:03:28]I've actually been lucky [music] enough to swim with a few common threshers, and even when hooked, they're not a threat to humans and incredibly graceful underwater.

[00:03:36]>> [music] >> But I've never seen a bigeye thresher, so we're really pushing the [music] boundaries this time.

[00:03:44]We quickly set the gear and settle in >> [music] >> to watch the rod tips and wait.

[00:03:52]And we didn't have to wait too long.

[00:03:53]You've got to love that early morning bite.

[00:04:01]Fish. Fish. Yeah.

[00:04:07]When you're losing string straight away, it means it's something big on the other end, and it's most likely not a sword.

[00:04:14]But luckily, we had Corey to do the winding, [music] and we quickly harnessed him in, so he couldn't say no.

[00:04:21]I'm usually very quiet when I've got something on the line, but I It's I'm in exactly the same boat. Could be a bit more excited about this one. It's It ran at the start, which you never have for a sword unless it's foul hooked, maybe.

[00:04:33]But threshers stay [music] down, and you fight them the whole way up, and Corey's been winding. You've probably got a few hundred meters back, 300 meters back here, so he's probably halfway up and still coming up.

[00:04:44]This is the thing we love. You have no idea what is down there.

[00:04:52]So, with the fish coming up, we still have no idea what it could be.

[00:04:57]It's not acting like a sword.

[00:04:59]Could this be the bigeye thresher we were chasing straight off the bat?

[00:05:04]But it's too [music] early to call it at this stage. Swing around on him there, Coops, for me. Let's try and get off him a bit.

[00:05:11]If I have to, we'll swing reverse after a while and trick it around that way.

[00:05:16]Half hour in, you've gained a bit of line, [music] that's a good thing.

[00:05:20]Ooh, I like I like I like.

[00:05:26]Yeah, mate, he's like Can you see it?

[00:05:28]She's like It's down there. You can't see down.

[00:05:33]If we keep gaining, we'll keep doing it.

[00:05:34]If it changes [music] and we start losing, we'll go do a reverse on him.

[00:05:39]So, he's still sitting up. He's put a bit of pressure on the way up there, like he's good [music] there at the start, and now he's a bit sort of He could be foul hooked, which [music] is why you get that weird run. We're almost an hour and a half into this fight, and we still haven't seen the fish. It's just sitting there, so we're going to have to move the boat to see if we can [music] get things happening, and it worked. That's a good run, that one.

[00:05:59]That's a much better run. Right in down there, Coops, so we're getting back in their corner. Yeah, yeah. Supporting.

[00:06:05]Very supportive, Decky.

[00:06:14]Yeah, Decky. Light's coming up. When the light is coming up, it means we're getting close, really close.

[00:06:20]And now it's time for the old man to take the wheel, so that I can do the heavy lifting. I think I might have to take off the lucky hat.

[00:06:31]We have Big thresher. Thresher? All right, I'm very excited.

[00:06:42]Enormous thresher. Nice and steady on him there.

[00:06:45]Like That's a big fish.

[00:06:51]Not in yet.

[00:06:53]Well, we just saw it. We thought it might be a thresher cuz we had that run straight up, and yeah, came up nice little [music] thresher, so I don't think he'll realize just big this shark is.

[00:07:03]I've never seen a thresher, and now I'm about to grab the leader. Got the leader.

[00:07:09]He's underneath the boat.

[00:07:11]Just made a bit.

[00:07:13]I know he's coming up. He's right beside the boat, Decky.

[00:07:25]Well, that didn't go to plan.

[00:07:30]Watch that.

[00:07:32]He's just in front of the boat.

[00:07:37]Just come forward slightly.

[00:07:41]Look at that.

[00:07:48]Look at that.

[00:07:50]That is so cool. This is so amazing. We have just caught an incredibly rare bigeye thresher shark.

[00:07:58]But sadly, it's not eligible for the satellite tag. However, we can still film it, so scientists [music] can have vital data on this rare species.

[00:08:08]Are you ready, Ords, to film?

[00:08:12]always ready to film.

[00:08:19]This is a potentially dangerous situation, but so far, everything was going to plan. Such a cool fish.

[00:08:28]That's it. That's the shark.

[00:08:32]And just when you thought everything was calm, it was anything but.

[00:09:09]Yep, things went pear-shaped pretty quickly. Who said wildlife filming isn't dangerous?

[00:09:24]Now I know what their prey feels like first hand. I said pull his head around and see if his head will come around here. Yeah, there you go.

[00:09:31]I said let go of that leader now, you can put that Coming in side, Coops. All right.

[00:09:44]Drop him there. Drag him in. Yep, Decky, you can drop it.

[00:09:53]There he goes.

[00:09:54]This is when you really see that they take off.

[00:09:57]Look at that. Straight down. This up here.

[00:10:06]Releasing this beautiful big eye thresher really got me curious and I wanted to know more.

[00:10:11]But I quickly discovered we know literally nothing about them.

[00:10:15]Because they aren't a [music] valuable commercial species, therefore they're low on the priorities list for research.

[00:10:21]But this made [music] me just want to get out there and see if this capture was more than a fluke. And is there in fact [music] an undiscovered population of big eye threshers right off Sydney?

[00:10:48]We're back on the water and heading to sea. [music] Only this time Coops has his final exams.

[00:10:54]So Tom and his boys have taken his place which is definitely an upgrade.

[00:11:02]>> [music] >> We wasted no time getting the baits down and then the waiting started.

[00:11:19]We're just sitting and waiting, you know, these big eye threshers we know literally nothing about them. We know they're across the Indo-Pacific and right into the Atlantic as well.

[00:11:28]We know they spend most of the time down deep 500 m. So we've got two baits down at different depths trying to find one.

[00:11:36]It's just sitting and waiting.

[00:11:38]And even though we don't have any set tags to put out just catching it will show that we're getting them in numbers, you know. Catching that fish the other day really opened our eyes that it's not just swordfish down there. You really are the new frontier fishing these depths and there's a lot of luck involved. You know, these threshers, big eye threshers are found Indo-Pacific and across in the Atlantic.

[00:12:00]They grow to, you know, 5-6 m in length and we've just got to come across one.

[00:12:14]The waiting game. Come on, give us a bite.

[00:12:19]The one thing I love [music] about the open ocean is you just never know what you're going to encounter. But what happened next was a first for all of us and it was way bigger than any thresher shark.

[00:12:45]Fishing wide off Sydney [music] we suddenly had one of the most unexpected encounters with a true ocean giant.

[00:12:57]And we all got a bit excited.

[00:13:17]I [music] can't believe there is a huge whale shark off Sydney this late in the season.

[00:13:22]There's no time to waste. I'm going [music] in.

[00:13:35]As soon as I jumped in the whale shark was curious and wanted to check me out.

[00:13:57]The whale shark is a tropical species and incredibly rare in temperate waters.

[00:14:02]But to see one off Sydney this late is a truly amazing event and it highlights [music] how our oceans are changing.

[00:14:10]Despite being hugely popular as an eco-tourism [music] we still know nothing about these gentle giants except they can grow to a staggering 20 tons [music] making them the biggest shark in the world and the friendliest.

[00:14:26]The encounter [music] was all too short but that didn't stop us from living it How insane was that?

[00:14:34]I cannot believe that just happened.

[00:14:36]Tom, you're sitting there going, "Oh, what's this? A sunfish." And then you go "It's not a sunfish. It's a whale shark."

[00:14:43]And it just comes swimming up and just bummed the boat.

[00:14:46]I've just raced, got my gear on, jumped in and swimming around with it and it's more instant with the fight like, "Ah."

[00:14:52]To see this off Sydney like straight off Sydney is so insane. And then it's like it comes up, he wanted to have a look at it so it's swimming around like swinging around to come up to me and I'm like, "Oh, I don't want to interfere." You know, you always want to be very conscious. This is what I love is that you see this stuff as I catch something amazing instead it swims up to us.

[00:15:15]Well, we didn't succeed on a thresher but we did have a once-in-a-lifetime encounter with the biggest shark in the sea and that's what I love about our job.

[00:15:25]Can't wait to see what tomorrow brings.

[00:15:31]>> [music] >> We're back on the hunt for big eye threshers. It's just all night [music] cuz Coops has got year 12 exams so he's studying while we fish.

[00:15:49]We know so little about the big eye [music] thresher. We think they live at depths around 500 m. If you look at a big eye thresher, their eyes are massive so it would be logical to presume they use the light to silhouette their prey.

[00:16:03]So with this in mind we're adding lights to draw them in.

[00:16:08]Getting your bait down half a kilometer is hard enough but Al always insists on setting two baits. And of course what happens as we try to set the second [music] bait?

[00:16:20]Ords is very quiet but I get excited and I yell a million instructions.

[00:16:28]Yeah, yeah.

[00:16:29]Don't wind on it. Just hold it. Is the fish pulling or is it you?

[00:16:32]Al yells but it's just white noise to me. I have it all under control.

[00:16:41]Suddenly we're on and this thing is screaming away. There is no way I'm grabbing it. I'm handing it over and hopefully it'll keep him busy [music] and shut him up.

[00:16:52]I pulled the rod out of the rod holder and then put it straight back. I'm going to need to take my jump off and get the harness on straight away cuz this is seriously big.

[00:17:04]We put the baits down and this one, we literally set this, went to set [music] the other one. We're like, "Oh, this is a bite behind you.

[00:17:12]There's a bite."

[00:17:13]And we're on straight away. The only thing is this thing loaded up straight away. We couldn't even get out of the rod holder initially so I'm not sure what it is but there's some serious weight on this thing.

[00:17:28]And this is what I love the most is you just have no idea what it is.

[00:17:34]It could be a shark, it could be a massive bass grouper, it could be a foul of thought, it still could be a sword.

[00:17:41]Starting to fire up a bit now. We're probably 250-300 m down still. Could be a thresher shark but we've had no runs.

[00:17:48]Threshers, you get the big eye threshers out here and they normally scream [music] off when you hook up.

[00:17:53]I just want to see what it is now.

[00:17:55]All I want to do is just see what's down there.

[00:18:03]It's definitely fighting a lot harder now. Like it's come up doughy and and now as we get closer probably only under 50 m from it now I'd say.

[00:18:15]Like what the hell? Still haven't seen it.

[00:18:17]No jumps, nothing.

[00:18:20]And then finally at the 3-hour mark we saw it.

[00:18:25]And as Al so eloquently put it F'ing big.

[00:18:29]Holy crap, we still can't make it out.

[00:18:31]But it's huge.

[00:18:41]Oh my god, it's massive.

[00:18:44]Think we just got ourselves a huge thresher shark.

[00:18:48]Look at this, you can see it there now.

[00:18:51]Look at the length of that thing.

[00:18:54]It did the run at the start so that's what made us think it could be a thresher.

[00:18:58]We thought the other shark was [music] big but this is a monster compared.

[00:19:02]Look at the size of the bloody thing.

[00:19:05]It's a big big shark. A bloody huge thresher.

[00:19:10]But now we have to unhook [music] it and release it carefully.

[00:19:15]With just two of us on board we're both multitasking, leadering, filming, driving. There's no room for error.

[00:19:26]Just touch us and gear there forward.

[00:19:27]Very slow words.

[00:19:29]Holy huge.

[00:19:31]Oh.

[00:19:39]Woo. Just want to get this fish up and let it go so we're not hurting it. And most [music] importantly I want to remove the hook this time but do it safely.

[00:19:49]Oh, what a beautiful fish.

[00:19:51]This is the problem. With just two of us on board, I have to lead to the fish while Oz is filming, but I have to do it in a way that doesn't hurt the fish or us. Have a look at that beautiful fish.

[00:20:03]He's only just hooked in the corner there.

[00:20:08]The one thing I really [music] want to do is to remove the hook to ensure this beautiful shark swims away healthy.

[00:20:14]Freaking a massive.

[00:20:20]Good?

[00:20:21]All right.

[00:20:28]He's away. He's away.

[00:20:31]Oh, look at it go.

[00:20:46]Oh, I wish we could set tag those puppies.

[00:20:48]Got a sore thumb, but I'm all It was at this point we realized Al hadn't come out unscathed from the encounter. How bad did he cut me up?

[00:20:57]I was wrapped up a bit there pulling hard on him.

[00:21:00]Look at it, straight through.

[00:21:04]Skinned me. Look at it.

[00:21:06]Went straight through the gloves.

[00:21:09]I was trying to hold it, just keep the head up just a little bit longer.

[00:21:14]Huge thresher shark.

[00:21:16]What an amazing fish, and he left me with a scar.

[00:21:23]Who said fishing was easy?

[00:21:28]I may have come out battered and bruised from my encounters [music] with these threshers, but it was so good to discover they are in numbers off Sydney. But as fish finding technology continues to improve, we need to be mindful of our impact as we fish ever deeper into the ocean. If early signs are anything to go by, then there is [music] certainly a healthy population of bigeye threshers off Sydney.

[00:21:50]But it's critical we do more research to [music] better understand these majestic creatures to ensure we look after them for future generations and ensure we have fish forever.