Commercial marine wildlife photographer Dale Frink had a close encounter of the worst kind on July 2 when a pair of blue whales surfaced beneath his inflatable boat, tossing him and the captain into the Pacific Ocean off San Diego.
Luckily for them, a nearby whale-watching boat steamed over and quickly pulled the two men aboard.
Luckily for the rest of us, Frink also had a waterproof GoPro video camera mounted to the helm to record his work. It did just that, capturing the moment Frink was startled by the dramatic close-up resurfacing of the whale and the counterclockwise rotation of the boat capsizing.
Frink posted the video on YouTube. It quickly went viral and drew plentiful media attention.
“This is NOT how I wanted to make national headlines with a photo,” Frink posted on his website.
