A Cape Cod Diver Was Swallowed Whole By A Humpback Whale And Miraculously Lived To Tell The Tale

There are near-death experiences, and then there’s this: As per CNN, a man in Cape Cod was swallowed whole by a humpback whale. But he lived to tell the tale.

That man is Michael Packard, a lobster diver who was doing his casually job off the coast of Provincetown, Massachusetts. The way he describes it sum it up best:

“I got down to about 45 feet of water, and all of a sudden I just felt this huge bump, and everything went dark,” Packard told CNN affiliate WBZ. “And I could sense that I was moving, and I was like, ‘”Oh, my God, did I just get bit by a shark?’”

“Then I felt around, and I realized there was no teeth and I had felt, really, no great pain,” Packard said. “And then I realized, ‘Oh, my God, I’m in a whale’s mouth. I’m in a whale’s mouth, and he’s trying to swallow me.’”

But the whale did not swallow him. After what Packard estimated were about 30 seconds, the whale shot to the surface and spat him out. He landed in the water, banged up but alive in and in one piece. He thought he may have broken a leg or two, but he did not.

A biologist told CNN that what happened was a rarity, and the whale was likely doing what’s called “lunge feeding,” in which they try to quickly gather a large volume of food in their mouth, not caring what they find. In this case, the whale scooped up a man and his diving equipment.

Packard still could have died, and not just from being swallowed. The speed with which the whale surfaced and ejected him could have caused an embolism from the air pressure in Packard’s lungs. But Packard remained calm and can now regale people with one whale of a tale.

(Via CNN)