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A family taking part in the vacation of a lifetime decided to go scuba diving in the hopes of seeing "a fish"—and got far more than they bargained for.
Marjorie Lounds, 46, lives in Phoenix, Arizona, and is mom to five kids aged between 11 and 23.
The family recently took a trip to the Cayman Islands, and as Lounds and four of her kids have their scuba diving certifications, decided to take an ocean dive—which would be some of the kids' first ocean diving experience.
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"My 19-year-old son jumped in first, followed by my 13-year-old daughter," she explained to Newsweek. "As I was getting ready with my 16-year-old son, my oldest suddenly said he was looking directly at three hammerhead sharks."
Lounds captured a video of the shock moment her family was approached by three hammerhead sharks and shared it to her Instagram account, @marjorielounds, and joked in the caption that before the trip, she had said: "I hope I see a fish."
Instead, she captured the moment her family realized a hammerhead shark was swimming right up to her teenage son.
And as she and others on the boat gasped and shouted "oh, my God!", the shark suddenly veered right, swimming towards her teenage daughter before disappearing.
The moment passed without incident, and the family were both shocked and awed to have had such a close encounter with the animal.
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"During the entire boat ride to the dive site, [my son] had been joking about seeing hammerheads, even though they're not commonly seen in that area," Lounds revealed to Newsweek.
"So when he first said there were hammerheads in the water, everyone thought he was kidding."
"He wasn’t," she went on." There really were three hammerheads, and one of them swam incredibly close to him."
The Cayman Islands are home to multiple species of sharks, including the Caribbean reef shark, nurse shark, and hammerhead shark.
According to the Department of Environment, sharks tend to be less abundant in areas with high human activity, including boat traffic and scuba diving. They are a vital part of the local environment, and a sighting of one means the coral reefs are healthy and thriving.
Hammerhead sharks are named for its unusual head shape, which looks like a hammer; there is no confirmed record of a hammerhead shark fatally attacking a human unprovoked, according to the International Shark Attack File.
Lounds described it to Newsweek as an "unforgettable moment, and definitely not what any of us expected for the start of the dive!"
She added that one staff member of the dive is also "absolutely obsessed with hammerhead sharks," and by "pure coincidence," was "even wearing swim trunks covered in hammerheads that day."
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Lounds' video had a huge reaction online, with close to 18,000 likes and hundreds of comments.
And while some shared in the family's joy in having such a close encounter, with one writing "I wish I could have this experience," others weren't as convinced.
"Are you joking," one wrote. "Nope. Nuh uh Super happy to live vicariously through you, good work out there!"
"Hammerheads are relatively safe to be around all things considered. That said, I’m getting out of the water and calling it a day after that," another admitted, as one said: "I'm surprised it came that close to check you out they're usually pretty standoffish!"
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Contact Newsweek editors for this story: Sirena Bergman and Gray R. Thomas
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