WATCH: Man in Chile Swallowed & Spit Out By Humpback Whale
A humpback whale breaches off the coast of Niteroi, Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil, Thursday, June 20, 2024. The whale-watching season has begun for tourists taking part in expeditions to get close to the humpback whales coming from Antarctica in search of warm waters to breed and have their babies. (AP Photo/Silvia Izquierdo)
A man in Chile went through one of the most harrowing experiences a person can go through—and lived to tell the tale. In a video that has since gone viral, a man and his son can be seen kayaking in the Strait of Magellan, in Chile, when a humpback whale briefly swallows one of them, and then quickly releases them unharmed.
The humpback whale can be seen in the video surfacing briefly, engulfing Adrián Simancas and his yellow kayak for a few seconds, before letting him go. His father, Dell, who was near him, can be heard telling his son to “Stay calm,” right after he was released, and asking him to “come closer” and “grab the boat, but don’t get on it.”
“I thought it swallowed me,” Adrián Simancas can be heard saying in the video as he finally makes it to his father. Both men remain relatively calm despite the situation, and eventually made it to shore without any permanent damage.
“When I turned around I didn’t see Adrián, my partner, my son. I didn’t see him, or see the boat, and I was shocked, I was worried.” Dell Simancas told Telemundo. “And then I saw him emerge, and then the boat and then I saw part of the whale’s body.”
The video gives a clear idea of both the size of the whale and how close Adrián Simancas came to a very different outcome.
“At first, I thought I was dead” Adrián said. “I thought I couldn’t do anything. And when I emerged I felt the real fear of something happening to my dad, or not making it to the shore in time, fear of hypothermia.” But in the end, he and his father both lived to tell the tale. And what a tale it is.