“It’s like swimming inside a snow globe.” When this diver dropped right into a distant reef, dozens of big animals appeared from the darkness

Fakarava’s south cross is greater than a reputation on a map. Divers converse of it like a ceremony of passage. In this distant hall, the present runs wild and the sharks run the present. Welcome to French Polynesia’s Wall of Sharks, the place a whole lot of gray reef sharks glide via the blue like they personal it. Which, in fact, they do.

I’ve encountered loads of sharks throughout greater than 170 dives: scores of reef sharks in Belize, just a few hulking tigers within the Bahamas, a dozen hammerheads 35m down in Sudan’s Red Sea. I feel I’m prepared for a predator-dominated reef, for the sort of drama that comes with numerous enamel. Apex predators are uncommon, toothy and huge sufficient to spike your coronary heart fee.

Turns out, I’m not fairly prepared for this. There’s good purpose for the positioning’s unreal fame: previously often called Tumakohua, the South Pass holds the densest recognized inhabitants of gray reef sharks on the planet. Anything from 600 to 900 cram into an atoll hole 200m large, drifting on the currents. These tides twist ‘normal’ topsy-turvy, creating an inverted trophic pyramid the place predators outnumber prey.

During spawning season, greater than 18,000 groupers pour via the cross in a veritable tidal buffet. But throughout the remainder of the yr, the tide delivers dinner within the type of parrotfish, surgeonfish and the rest swept into vary – an oceanic Uber Eats.

We descend right into a sprawling arduous coral reef the place visibility stretches to 45m – “a bit murky”, our information recollects later with a shrug. Murky. Sure. Sharks immediately materialise. One. Two. I rapidly lose rely. They’re all over the place. Above, under, slicing via the blue like silent torpedoes.

We drift right into a billowing cloud of scad, a flashing, swirling shroud of silver that holds formation as sharks drift via. No chase. No frenzy. Just the gradual, surreal precision of animals which have mastered the circulation.

Time falls aside. Four minutes cross in response to my GoPro however I’m barely aware of it. A Napoleon wrasse ghosts by, massive as a labrador. Its eye lingers on me. Not curious. Not involved. Just conscious.

Dive two drops us straight into the center of this cartilage cloud. ‘Murky’ no extra, limitless visibility ushers me right into a gully thick with sharks packed fin to fin, going through into the present like statues.

I, in the meantime, am struggling. I seize a rock for stability earlier than being whipped downstream the second I let go. The sharks don’t transfer. They hover exactly the place tidal currents collide on the reef’s upward slope. This ensuing updraft permits them to journey together with barely a flick of effort, trimming their power use by a important 10 to fifteen per cent. It’s the searching equal of holding the excessive floor.

We cease 3 times alongside the slope. Each spot is extra crowded than the final. By the ultimate maintain, it’s like swimming inside a snow globe (if snow had enamel and excellent spatial consciousness). At first, it feels chaotic. Then it clicks. The sharks are rotating via the present like cyclists sharing the wind load. Scientists name it shuttling behaviour, a slow-motion relay optimised to avoid wasting power in a high-flow world.

By dive three, the tempo has shifted. The present softens. Visibility dims. The reef continues to be stuffed with sharks however quieter now, as if the curtain has come down. We drift via like we’re watching the top credit roll.

And that feels proper. Because this reef – pulsing with present, brimming with predators – isn’t placing on a present. It’s functioning. No fishing. No damaged hyperlinks within the chain. Just historical stability.

We ascend slowly. I look again, simply as soon as, to see if any shark is watching. Of course they’re not. They’re busy. The tide is about to show. Dinner’s served.

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Top picture: gray reef sharks. Credit: Alexandra Gillespie