Landes: a shark, stuck in a swimming area, brought back offshore by a lifeguard

It is an unusual scene which took place on the beach of the Océanides in Capbreton, in the Landes. On August 4, a young blue shark, about 90 centimeters, found himself trapped in a supervised swimming area, due to the shorebreak , these waves breaking at the edge, directly on the sand. "The shark is disoriented, panicked," Brigadier Gregory Metge, CRS 43, on duty that day told Europe 1. Its presence arouses the panic of swimmers, we must act. So, courageously, the policeman grabs the animal and helps it get back out to sea.

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Congratulations and children's drawings

"I grabbed him with my bare hands, the first time by the tail, but he tried to turn around and bite me, to defend himself", explains Grégory Metge. "Second shot I grabbed him in the back of the head so I could pass the first wave with him." The jet skis of the town hall's rescuers also come to its aid to allow the animal to take to the open sea. In an interview with the newspaper Sud Ouest, the lifeguard swimmer CRS confided his passion for these marine mammals since childhood. This is how he was able to quickly estimate that this species of shark was not dangerous for humans. 

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The scene was filmed and the video has already been viewed over 500,000 times. "It is really an exceptional intervention, out of the ordinary", confides the sergeant, who remains modest, in spite of the visits of onlookers who ask him if he is really "the savior of shark". "It's funny, people say thank you, congratulate, we even had the opportunity at the first aid station to have children's drawings with little hearts, little misspellings, it's wonderful."