World Travel HD

Whale Shark Sighting Update

April 30, 2012

While we were on Utila Island off Honduras doing our dive master course, we got the chance to snorkel with Whale Sharks on several occasions. On a few of those I managed to get a couple of photos of the Whale Sharks and once we were back on-shore I had been speaking to a couple of the dive instructors about it and was pointed to this website: http://whaleshark.org

The website uses software that was originaly designed for mapping stars in photographs to instead map the specific occurrence of spots around the dorsal fin of the Whale Sharks. Like fingerprints on humans, the layout of the spots on each Whale Shark is a unique identifier and so just by taking photographs, the movement of Whale Sharks over the months and years can be tracked.

I uploaded a pair of photos from that session and within a couple of days the software on the website had finished processing and the Whale Shark we had seen was identified as H-014 (very original name..). And one of the cool things about this website is that each time another set of photos identifying that specific shark get uploaded, all the previous submitters get an update.

And this week, an update came through – the Whale Shark we saw is back for another season and had been seen by another photographer. Quite a cool thing to pop up in your inbox out the blue!

Now just to get ourselves back for another season…

Entry Filed under: Honduras. .