A British diver found himself under attack from a deadly shark while exploring a stunning shoal in Egypt.
Gary Virgo was taking a dive off of the Red Sea Coast when his dive partner noticed the predator swimming above them.
In the shocking footage, the oceanic whitetip shark dropped down to his level, circling closer and closer, before ramming into the diver.
Virgo, from Peacehaven, East Sussex, said: ‘He made a beeline for me and then he headbutted me. The force of it pushed me back into the water – my legs have gone up.
‘It messed my breathing up a little bit, because I was stunned, I just couldn’t believe it – that wasn’t meant to happen.’
Oceanic whitetips have a reputation for being aggressive and were described by oceanographer Jacques Cousteau as ‘the most dangerous of all sharks’.
They’ve also been blamed for the notorious 1945 attacks on the crew of the USS Indianapolis, who were left adrift in the Pacific after their ship was sunk by the Japanese.
But Gary is an experienced diver, so he wasn’t fazed, and ‘braced himself’ for what came after the shark rammed into him.
He said: ‘I just stood my ground and stuck to what I’m used to in training.
‘Normally if they’re going towards you, they turn around at the last minute and then go off, but he just came in.’
But the shark’s aggression spooked Virgo, and he abandoned the dive with his mate after just nine minutes.
He said: ‘What I said to myself was ‘I’m glad I’m okay, I’m glad I’ve got back to the boat fine,’ because you do look over your shoulder even when you’re swimming back to the boat.’
Virgo said he thinks the shark was attracted to him due to his yellow, orange and white striped diving gear.
He said: ‘I’ve read that they don’t like yellow and orange; it’s the colours they go for.
‘Also my dive computer was bleeping, because I was fluctuating in the water – I was going up and down, because I was spinning round and following him. So that’s another reason: I reckon it was the sound.’
However, the encounter hasn’t dampened Gary’s enthusiasm for sharks – and he said he hopes to go cage diving with great whites.
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