A massive, almost 14 foot white shark has been pinged by the organization OCEARCH off the coast of Savannah Monday morning.
Mahone, an adult shark, is the largest male shark tagged by OCEARCH in Canadian waters. OCEARCH is a global non-profit conducting research on the oceans' giants — like sharks — to help scientists collect previously unattainable data in the ocean, according to their website.
He was tagged during OCEARCH's expedition Nova Scotia near Lunenburg, Nova Scotia and was named after Mahone Bay. He can be tracked on their website.
Another white shark, Keji, has also pinged near Savannah recently on Nov. 19. Keji is almost 10 feet long and a juvenile shark, weighing almost 600 pounds. He is named after the Kejimkujik National Park and Historic Site, a region near where he was tagged.
He was the 82nd tagged shark of the Northwest Atlantic White Shark Study, and the ninth shark tagged during the Nova Scotia expedition in 2021.
Jekyll, a near 9 foot juvenile shark, is also near the coast of Charleston, but was named by OCEARCH's community in honor of Jekyll Island, GA, where he was first tagged in early December last year.
He was the third shark tagged during Expedition Southbound, their 44th ocean research expedition to learn more about these animals as they migrate to the southeast of the U.S. for the winter.
Jekyll was the 87th white shark tagged in the Western North Atlantic and can also be tracked through their website. According to his tracker, he has been all up and down the east coast all year, before returning here for his winter residency.
Destini Ambus is the general assignment reporter for Chatham County municipalities for the Savannah Morning News. You can reach her at dambus@gannett.com
This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Nearly 14-foot research shark reported off the coast of Savannah
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