Australian researchers capture vision of shark in near-freezing water

Australian researchers have captured vision of a shark in near-freezing water in Antarctica for the first time.

The sleeper shark was found in the spotlight of the video camera 490 metres deep in the Antarctic Ocean in January 2025, where the water temperature was 1.27 degrees.

Western Australia‘s Minderoo-UWA Deep-Sea Research Centre released the footage this week.

Australian researchers have captured vision of a shark in near-freezing water in Antarctica for the first time. (AP)

Founding director Alan Jamieson told The Associated Press he could find no record of another shark in the vicinity.

He estimated the shark was a between three and four metres.

“We went down there not expecting to see sharks because there’s a general rule of thumb that you don’t get sharks in Antarctica,” Jamieson said.

“It’s not even a little one either, it’s a hunk of a shark, these things are tanks.”

Charles Darwin University conservation biologist Peter Kyne said a shark had never before been recorded so far south and the centre’s footage was “quite significant”.

“The shark was in the right place, the camera was in the right place and they got this great footage,” Kyne said.

Kyne said there was limited data on sharks near Antartica due to the region’s remoteness.

Jamieson said other Antarctic sharks could live at the same depth but few research cameras were positioned at that depth in Antarctic waters and those that were operated during the summer months.

“The other 75 per cent of the year, no one’s looking at all,” Jamieson said.

“This is why, I think, we occasionally come across these surprises.”

– With Associated Press

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