A PE Tour operator narrowly escaped with his life after nearly being swallowed by a whale, during a sardine run.
During a sardine run, shoals of sardines migrate along the Western Cape, and northward to the city of Durban in KwaZulu-Natal.
51-year-old Rainer Schimpf, who takes tourists whale watching in Algoa Bay, was filmed with his legs hanging out of a Bryde’s whale’s mouth.
Schimpf’s wife, Silke, watched in horror as her husband’s head and torso disappeared into the whale’s mouth as he was filming a bait ball of sardines in February.
“It happened extremely fast, from an observer, I suddenly became an inside man, inside a whale,” Schimpf said.
After a few seconds the whale washed out out the wetsuited snorkeler.
After the ordeal Schimpf concluded that: “I now have inside knowledge of a whale which nobody else has.”
Watch video below:
More: timeslive