Whales are pretty incredible creatures. They're collosal, they're epicute, and a lot of them are endangered because they used to be hunted mercilessly. Well, since they're such a charismatic creature, folks have been banning together to protect these maritime baritone singers because they simply love them so much. However, not everyone feels that the whales need their fair share of respect in the wild. One professional kite surfer who lives in Cape Town, Lasse Waker, recently captured an insane POV shot of him jumping/flying over a pair of humpback whales in the ocean.
In the video you can see him clearly charging the whales and then yanking the kite at the last minute so that he can pop over them and soar through the air for an aerial view. It's a pretty incredible shot with both a once-in-a-lifetime subject (the whales), from a never-before-seen angle (from a kite with a man and a board attached to it). However, the video received TONS of backlash in the comments section, with naturists coming at him from all sides for blatant negligence towards the whales on their migratory path.
If this was a chance encounter, for example, if he had accidentally stumbled upon these whales and thought “oh dang, I'm about to run into some whales” and then jumped over them, that could potentially be accepted by the public. However, he has several videos of multiple jumps he made over the same whales, meaning he must have been following, and harassing, these oceanic beauties. If you know anything about kite surfing, you know that fighting the wind is an uphill battle, so the amount of time he must have spent tailing the whale's trajectory and adjusting his own path via the wind and surf, means he was probably a thorn in the whales side (bouncing all around them and probably spooking them) for quite a while.
So despite the footage coming out really cool and super epic, it's a bummer that Lasse was potentially causing a panic for a pair of whales who were just trying to migrate up and down the coast in peace. Obviously the whales weren't physically hurt (at least we sure hope not 👊), but perhaps what we can take from this is that the ocean is a shared playground for everyone– stay in your lane.
Two whales, one epic jump! 🐋
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