Florida fisherman gets close encounter with great white shark

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (STORYFUL) - Fishermen off a Florida coast were surprised to see a great white shark swimming circles around their boat.

Their fishing trip was interrupted on Saturday when the large shark was spotted swimming near them about 40 miles off the coast of Ponce Inlet, near Daytona Beach, Florida.

Kyle Morningstar captured video of the encounter. One of the fishermen can be heard using a few expletives to describe his astonishment. 

Morningstar told The Daytona Beach News-Journal that he went fishing in the area every second weekend and that he estimated that the shark was 12 to 15-feet long, noticing it was more than half the size of his 23-foot boat. The 31-year-old from Port Orange  said him and his friend, Ian Smith, were catching and releasing red snapping, while also fishing for other types of fish.

It was around 2:30 p.m. when they started pulling the anchor of their boat when Morningstar saw remora fish darting toward what looked like a "great, gray blob." When it surfaced, they realized it was a great white shark.

“We ran around our boat and that monster shark just circled around us, did two laps just checking us out. It was not scared.” Morningstar told the News-Journal. “It was not scared. After it disappeared, we hurried to get ashore."