Incredible: Humpback Whale Briefly Swallowed Kayaker in Chile

The kayaker, Adrián Simancas, was paddling unsuspectingly near the city of Punta Arenas in Patagonia when suddenly a huge whale emerged from the water and completely swallowed him and his yellow boat, as shown in a recording. Five seconds later, the stunned Simancas resurfaced unharmed.

The scene, captured on camera and which occurred last Saturday, later went viral. It was published on online networks by Simancas' father, Dell Simancas. In the recording, Simancas can be heard shouting to his father: "I thought it had swallowed me." His father, rushing to help his visibly shocked son, tried to calm him with the words: "Relax, relax, I'm coming."

Later, the father told the TV channel TVN that during the three seconds when his son suddenly disappeared, he was "really scared." "And suddenly he shot out." Despite the frightening incident, father and son assured that they want to continue kayaking together in the future.

Swallowed by a Humpback Whale: Kayaker Didn't Know What Happened to Him

Simancas told the channel CNN en Español that at first, he didn't realize what had happened to him. "When I turned around, I felt something slimy on my face. I saw colors like dark blue, white, something approaching from behind, closing in... and pulling me down," he said. According to experts, however, humpback whales are not capable of this due to their small throats.

"At that moment, I thought I couldn't do anything, that I was going to die. I didn't know what it was," he further explained. Only when he was back on the water's surface did he slowly understand what had happened.

24-Year-Old Escaped with a Fright

According to marine biologist Maria José Pérez from the University of Chile, incidents like these are "very rare." She speculated to the news agency AFP that the kayak was "exactly in the whale's feeding area" with krill or fish. It was seen in the recording how the whale "came to the surface sideways with an open mouth." The marine mammal probably didn't even notice the small boat.

Humans or other mammals are not on the menu for humpback whales. Their prey consists of krill, which are small crustaceans and plankton, as well as fish. The whales use lamellar horn plates in their upper jaw to filter the small prey from the water. They do not have teeth.

"The kayaker was probably just in the whale's way while it was feeding," says Judith Denkinger, curator for marine mammals at the Stralsund Oceanographic Museum, who has been working with humpback whales for more than 20 years. "The way the whale surfaced, with its mouth open: they do that when they are feeding, there was probably a school of fish there."

Finding a human in a whale's mouth is extremely rare, and probably only happens accidentally. However, individual cases have been reported, such as in 2021, when a lobster diver claimed to have been in a humpback whale's mouth. The biblical story of Jonah, who was swallowed by a whale and released after three days, is also famous.

Humpback Whales Have No Teeth, But Baleen

In humpback whales, explains expert Denkinger, the throat is not particularly large either. "Maybe like a soccer ball." Therefore, they cannot swallow humans. "I'm also glad that the whale was able to spit out the kayak and the paddle. That wouldn't have been good for it."

The humpback whales, which can grow up to 16 meters long and live in all the world's oceans, belong to the baleen whales. With these horn plates in their upper jaw, they filter krill and fish from the water. When feeding, they let their mouths fill with water and then press the water out again, leaving the prey caught in the baleen.

According to experts, the whales use various techniques to herd and encircle their prey. For example, they swim around their schools of fish and krill, enclosing the prey in bubble curtains. They then tighten the bubble nets, push the prey to the surface, and finally snap from below.

"Humpback whales are very, very smart," says Denkinger. It could also be that the humpback whale in Chile took the young man into its mouth possibly in play. "The whale was still young, it wasn't that big yet. Maybe it was just curious and playful."

(APA/Red)

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