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Their throats can stretch to about 15 inches in diameter, so it would be difficult for a humpback whale to actually swallow a human being. They have baleen instead of teeth and feed on krill and small fish by straining large amounts of ocean water through their baleen like a sieve.
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In general, humpback whales are not aggressive. In 2020, kayakers in California were caught in a whale’s mouth as it was feeding and in 2019, a tour operator in South Africa had a similar experience. There have been other recent stories of people getting too close to comfort with humpback whales. This unusual ocean encounter is being called a modern-day Jonah and the Whale story, which has brought the Old Testament lore and the possibility of being swallowed by a whale back into mainstream debate. Packard was taken to hospital in a waiting ambulance suffering from a dislocated knee and soft tissue damage. Mayo rescued Packard and then radioed the shore and returned to the pier. She reported Packard’s crewman Josiah Mayo had seen the whale fling her brother into the sea after noticing some action at the top of the water. He sees them all the time out there,” said Packard’s sister Cynthia Packard. I’m done, I’m dead.’”Īt first, Packard said he thought he was inside a great white shark, but realized it was a whale after feeling around the darkness and not finding teeth. “I was completely inside it was completely black… I thought to myself, ‘there’s no way I’m getting out of here. “All of a sudden, I felt this huge shove and the next thing I knew it was completely black,” he said in an interview with the Cape Cod Times.
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The Cape Cod Times reported the 56-year-old veteran diver was inside of the whale’s mouth for between 30 to 40 seconds before the whale breached, shook its head and spit Packard out. On June 11, 2021, Michael Packard, a commercial lobster diver, was on his second dive of the day when he was swallowed by a humpback whale.