Humpback whale spotted breaching water off the coast of Cornwall
Jacob Rheams, 20, captured this video of the whale, using his drone.
A humpback whale has been filmed breaching the water off the coast of Cornwall. Student Jacob Rheams caught the moment from the air in Falmouth and shared it on Facebook on Tuesday 5 March.
The sighting is the fourth in the county in just a matter of months.Jacob, 20, studies at Falmouth University, and said that he sprang into action, setting his drone up as soon as he saw the creature.
He said: "I was at Pendennis filming dolphins for a uni project when I saw a message on a group chat that a whale - species unknown at that time - had been spotted just along the coast."So I quickly had a look in that direction not really expecting to see anything when it suddenly popped up only about 20 meters off from Pendennis Point.
"So I quickly sent my drone up to try to capture it."The visibility in the water was absolutely horrendous though and as soon as it was about a metre under it just completely vanished, so to try and maximise my chances I went up high enough to give me a good field of view and hoped for the best.
"Which worked seeing as I got a short clip of it coming up for air before a deep dive. While the footage isn’t award-winning or anything, I’m still over the moon to have been able to capture such an amazing animal."There are at least three humpbacks spending time around the Cornish coast, including off the north coast in and around St Ives Bay.
Just last month, a whale named Humpy was captured on camera off St Ives and confirmed as the same creature that had been seen off the Isle of Man and Wales.
The humpback whale population is believed to be 140,000 worldwide and they live for up to 75 years.
Since 2019, they've been spotted a little closer to home - with sightings at Mount's Bay, the Lizard, St Ives, Sennen and Padstow.
Experts at Cornwall Wildlife Trust believe the population of whales is showing signs of recovery, since commercial whaling was banned in 1982.
Climate change could also be affecting migration routes.