A video shows part of the 30-minute struggle to use rod-and-reel to catch a great white shark off Hatteras Island, North Carolina. The shark was released back into the ocean.
HATTERAS ISLAND, N.C. – A team of North Carolina fishermen had the catch of a lifetime this month when they reeled in a 12-foot-long great white shark from the surf of the Atlantic Ocean.
Video recorded on March 15 from the Outer Banks region shows the intense half-hour it took to reel in the monster shark.
“Holy crap! That’s a great white,” the voice behind the camera exclaims.
Dan Rothermel told Storyful News that Luke Beard is the angler who hooked the great white shark on a beach along Hatteras Island.
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Beard told the Island Free Press it took 35 minutes to bring in the shark, but it never left the water and was released in under two minutes.
A group of rod-and-reel fishermen with a 12-13 foot great white shark on a Hatteras Island Beach on March 15, 2025. The shark was caught and released.
(Dan Rothermel/Luke Beard via Storyful)
“Our number one concern was getting her back into deep water. She swam off and disappeared back into the beautiful magical blue water of Hatteras Island,” Rothermel wrote on Instagram.
The white shark is protected under an international agreement known as the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, which was signed in 1973 by 184 countries.
“In the Atlantic, recreational fishermen who hold the appropriate permits are allowed to intentionally fish for white sharks with rod and reel gear as long as they release the shark immediately without removing the shark from the water and without further harming the shark,” according to NOAA Fisheries.