Posted on 10/27/2025 7:36:44 PM PDT by Red Badger
Whales are great security, but it’s not always the gentlest rescue. Image credit: Andrea Izzotti / Shutterstock.com
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While filming on location off Rarotonga in the Cook Islands, whale scientist Nan Hauser was swimming towards two humpback whales when one of them started charging at her. When it approached, it started moving as if it were trying to tuck her under its fin – not a very comfortable maneuver for a human being hugged by a multi-ton giant with razor-sharp barnacles on its fins.
Fearing for her life, things only got scarier as the humpback whale hoisted her out of the water and onto its back. She tried to swim away multiple times, but it wouldn’t let her.
Eventually she was able to put some distance between her and the enormous humpback whale. Only then did she understand why it had been behaving so strangely.
In the distance, she could see what looked like two whales, one of which was smacking its tail against the water. On closer inspection, she could see that the second whale was moving peculiarly, with its pectoral fins tucked in and its tail swishing side to side instead of up and down.
It was at this point Hauser realized she was looking at the biggest tiger shark she’d ever seen.
VIDEO AT LINK..................
“I’ve spent my entire life underwater and I’ve seen plenty of tiger sharks,” she explained during a 2021 interview with BBC Earth. “This was like a truck. This was a huge tiger shark, and it was coming right for me.”
It’s Hauser’s belief that the whale was trying to get her under its fin to protect her. While we can’t speak Whale (yet) to ask the animal what it was doing, the whale’s final act during that fraught interaction was to get Hauser on its back and ferry her back to her boat. With such a sizable tiger shark on the prowl, it likely saved her life even if it didn’t mean to.
“I still to this day can’t believe it happened and being a scientist it’s even harder,” she said. “If someone told me this story, I wouldn’t believe them.”
Humpbacks are known to exhibit altruism, a behavioral trait where you do something for another individual that in no way benefits you. Hauser's story is an exceptional example if the whale was indeed trying to save her life, as it means the whale put itself in danger to protect an unrelated species.
VIDEO AT LINK...................
Quite the hero, then, and amazingly Hauser got to be reunited with her rescuer one year and 15 days later. She was radioed that a whale had swum into the area, and after boating out to see it, spotted that it had two notches on its tail fluke – just like the one that had saved her life.
“And then next I knew the whale came up next to the side of the boat," said Hauser. "He ignored everyone else on the boat, and he stared directly at me… I looked at him, and I saw a scar on his head, and I just screamed ‘he’s back I can’t believe it he’s back!’ and sure enough there he was.”
“I just whipped on my wet skin and slid [into the] water and I swam down next to him and he opened his eyes and he just looked at me and kept nudging me... It was like seeing your dog that you haven’t seen in six months.”
At 27-33 tons, that’s one hell of a cuddle. Hauser hopes that one day she’ll get to see her cetacean pal again. "I miss him," she said. "I mean, who misses a whale?"
An earlier version of this article was published in November 2021.
NOW that is a cool story...
No kidding!!
Aboard a destroyer, I always felt better when dolphins were around our ship.
Name of whale? Quasimodo, of course.
Whale sharks are supposedly filter feeders and “pose no threat to humans”...though VERY large for a fish.
Tiger shark ...not a whale shark. Get some sleep...dude...
I got teary-eyed listening to her describe their reunion! Absolutely incredible! Thank you for posting!
Wonderful story. Many thanks.
I mean a humpback whale brain is three to five times as large as a humans with similar cellular complexity. 10-14lbs vs 3 draw from that what you will. These animals communicate across thousands of miles and speak several different dialects to each other. That also are some of the few animals to pass the self awareness test same for orcas and dolphins who have similar brain masses.
Needed to read something like this today. What a great story, all the way around. While paling in comparison, my personal story is that of once being thoroughly checked out by a dolphin who I think wanted to play. Came up along side me, looked a me, shot off, circled around, and did it again. Once he figured I couldn’t swim any faster, he just flicked his tail a few times and vanished.
In Canada, they’d just kill the whale.
I think whales in general HATE sharks and see them as a natural enemy.
I don’t think this humpback had any sympathy for the human, I think it was just looking to deny the shark a meal.
To the human, of course, that’s a difference without a distinction but it reeks of anthropomorphization to conjecture that the animal’s overarching concern was her “protection.”
Awww, it made me want to blubber and it wasn’t fishy at all......
🐳🐋🐳
🙄🙄🙄
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