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| My man C.L. Smooth was at White Horse Beach for this picture, but that sign may need to go up off Duxbury Beach this morning... |
It's swim at you own risk time in Deluxebury, as an as-yet-unconfirmed sighting of a Great White Shark went down off of Ocean Road North this morning.
The sighting was made by a boater. I could not confirm if it was a more sea-wary Fisherman type of boater. Either way, there's a 10-15 foot fish close enough to shore that the witness was able to assign a street name to his report.
Many fish are mistaken for the Great White. Basking Sharks are common off Duxbury Beach, and usually show up around this time of year, too. They are actually larger than Great Whites, and an inexperienced observer or even a good one who got a hurried look at it could make a classification mistake. They eat nothing but plankton.
If you can see the dorsal fin, here's how you tell a Great White Shark from a Basking Shark. The GWS fin is pointier, like a surfboard, and has a sharp tip. The dorsal fin of a Basking Shark is much more rounded, and looks like the end of an ironing board. The dorsal fin of the Basking Shark will also flop around limply as the shark turns in the water. The GWS, on the other hand, is always on that Cialis tip.
The sighting could also be an Ocean Sunfish, which can get up to 10 feet or so. The video with the Boston guy cursing at a sea monster involved a sunfish.
Dolphins and even whales can also be mistaken for a GWS, and are common enough in Duxbury's waters.
Also, keep in mind that the guy who is telling you about Basking Sharks and Sunfish is sitting comfortably onshore in Bourne. The guy who actually saw the fish in question is saying "Great White Shark."
Either way, the Duxbury Harbormaster is advising you to stay out of the waters off of Duxbury this morning. He sent some boats out to investigate the sighting, but he found nothing. The Atlantic White Shark Conservancy did not detect this shark on their tagged-shark detection buoys.
As my Doctor told me once.... "It's the law of the sea, they said. Civilization ends at the waterline. After that, we all enter the food chain, and not always right at the top."
We have several reporters embedded in the region, and will update you when we have some more information.
Be careful out there, my friends. This magazine can not afford to lose any readers.
UPDATE.... he's hanging around, he just set off the shark detector buoy at 2:42 PM today.
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