WINTHROP, MASS. (WHDH) - A Massachusetts couple on a fishing trip in Boston Harbor captured video of a whale breaching near their boat.
“It was pretty calm out there, and then all of a sudden, we hear a big slap in the water. We turned around, but there was really, there was no boats, nothing there,” said Joe Fabiano. “Not even a minute later, all of a sudden, a whale came up and just started jumping out of the water. It was pretty amazing.”
The couple was off the coast of Winthrop between Deer Island and Long Island. They captured footage of the whale breaching two more times around 70 feet from the boat.
“It was pretty close, but, you know, once it went back in, we kinda just stayed away from it,” said Fabiano. “Next you know, it was a little further away. The next time it looked like it was starting to head back out into the deeper water.”
Humpback whales have been spotted up and down the Massachusetts coast this summer. Environmental Police said three juvenile whales have been feeding off of Manomet Point and Whitehorse Beach in Plymouth.
In late July, a whale breached onto a boat off the coast of Plymouth, nearly capsizing it. No one got injured in the incident.
“A lot of people just get excited when they see the whales, they want to get a post on Instagram if you will, or whatever the type of social media, which is all well and good – but we need to do that safely,” said National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration investigator Troy Audyatis.
Experts warn there should always be a 100-foot buffer zone between whales and boaters.
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