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TEXT BY HOWARD HALL / PHOTOS BY MICHELE HALL
Lying on the aluminum mesh floor, my video camera protruding from the small door as our shark
cage skimmed over the kelp-covered reef, I finally reached an embarrassing conclusion. I was
going to run low on air first and would have to be the one to call an end to this dive. I checked
my pressure gauge again — almost time. I didn’t look up. Peter Kragh and Jeff Wildermuth were
behind me shooting stills. Younger, fitter and capable of better air consumption, they would be
forced to terminate the 55-foot dive while five great white sharks circled the cage, often passing
through rocky canyons festooned in golden algae. It doesn’t get better than this, and I was going to
be the guy to say “uncle.” I quickly turned my eye back to the viewfinder, capturing another scene
as a 14-foot great white followed the drifting cage, the huge predator gliding over amber fronds
and green sea grass. A few minutes passed before I checked my gauge again. OK, that’s it. I had to
make the move. I had to admit it. “I ain’t as good as I once was …,” the song went off in my head.
I pushed myself up and turned around.
Peter and Jeff were pressed against the side of the cage breathing from an emergency bailout
tank strapped to the floor. Peter had a thin blue rope in his hand and was feverishly pulling it and
pointing upward. Three pulls (or more, should you freak out and lose count) means “up.” Rodney
Fox was on deck high above holding the rope, his sensitive fingers
waiting impatiently for the signal. Peter looked at me and pointed
up again while jerking a half dozen times on the rope. Uh oh.
The cage had been spinning on its suspension cable as
strong winds blew the M/V Princess II back and forth
across the cove at North Neptune Island. As the cage
spun, the signal rope had wrapped itself a couple
dozen times around the cable.
Normally, Rodney would not leave divers down
more than 45 minutes. He would have made sure
one of his experienced crew members was in the
cage to prevent this sort of nonsense. But Rodney
respected my crew and me as professional divers.
He knew we were having a great dive. He knew we all
had superior air-consumption skills. He knew we
wouldn’t want to be brought up before we were ready.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. I pushed myself off the floor and
threw open the door at the top of the cage. I looked through
the 50 feet of water between me and the Princess II’s swim
step. I couldn’t help but notice the five great white sharks
separating me from the surface, safety and lunch.
The waters of South Australia are cold and often murky,
but they hold wonders that rival the most spectacular
inhabitants of the Coral Triangle. During the making of
our IMAX 3D feature film, Under the Sea 3D, Michele
Hall and I spent two weeks scouting the marine life of
South Australia. We returned a year later for a four-
week filming expedition in the temperate waters off Cape
Catastrophe. Our goal was to capture 3D images of four of
South Australia’s most iconic marine denizens. Certainly
the most famous of these is the great white shark.