A 26-year-old British fishermen had the fight of his life on his hands when he hooked a massive six-gill shark while fishing off the coast of County Clare in Ireland.
Builder Ben Bond was actively fishing for six-gills off Loop Head on Thursday 4 May, but he wasn't expecting to catch such a gigantic specimen – skipper Luke Aston estimated that the shark was over seven and a half metres long and weighed in excess of 680kg, which would make it the biggest six-gill ever caught on a fishing rod in Europe. It took Bond over an hour and a half to bring the huge fish to the surface, where after a few photographs were hastily taken, it was released and swam back into the depths.
Bond said: “Watching it swim away was probably the best part, I wouldn't want to kill such an impressive creature.”
Six-gill sharks are deep-water fish, which predate other fish, including other shark species, but also take seals on occasion. They are apparently often caught around Loop Head, but not of this monstrous size.
Photo credit: Luke Aston / www.fishandstay.com
