In a breathtaking and terrifying incident off the Chilean coast, a kayaker experienced a close encounter with a humpback whale, finding himself briefly engulfed within the massive creature's mouth. The incident, captured on video by the kayaker's father, unfolded last Saturday in Bahía El Águila near the San Isidro Lighthouse, located in the Strait of Magellan off Chilean Patagonia.
Adrián Simancas was kayaking with his father, Dell, when a humpback whale surfaced, its mouth agape, inadvertently scooping Simancas and his inflatable kayak into its jaws. The whale quickly submerged, leaving Dell to watch in horror. Moments later, the whale's tail emerged, followed by Simancas and his yellow kayak, miraculously unharmed.
Dell, who documented the entire event, urged his son to remain calm amidst the chaos. "Stay calm, stay calm," he can be heard saying in the video after Adrián resurfaced. Recounting the ordeal, Adrián admitted to fearing for his life. "I thought I was dead," he shared. "I thought it had eaten me, that it had swallowed me."
Beyond the immediate shock of being inside the whale's mouth, Adrián described the subsequent fear of potential harm to his father or succumbing to the frigid waters. "When I came up and started floating, I was scared that something might happen to my father too, that we wouldn’t reach the shore in time, or that I would get hypothermia," he explained.
Fortunately, both father and son managed to return to shore safely, without any physical injuries. The Strait of Magellan, a popular tourist destination known for its adventurous activities, is located approximately 1,600 miles south of Santiago, Chile. The area's challenging cold waters add an element of risk to activities like kayaking.
While whale attacks on humans are rare in Chilean waters, the region has seen a rise in whale deaths due to collisions with cargo ships and an increase in whale strandings over the past decade.
