What was the family doing when they saw the whale shark?

BY JASON BITTEL

PUBLISHED AUGUST 8, 2018

    While free-diving off the shore of Kaunolû on Hawaii’s island of Lanai, a Hawaiian family saw something they’d never seen before: A young whale shark.

   But the initial wonder faded as Kapua Kawelo and her husband Joby Rohrer, both of whom work on endangered species for the O‘ahu Army Natural Resources Program, noticed the creature had a thick, heavy rope wrapped around its neck.

   “It looked really sore,” says Rohrer. “There were these three scars from where the rope rubbed into the ridges on her back. The rope had cut probably three inches into her pectoral fin.” 

    After filming the shark for a while, the family decided to try to cut the rope with a dive knife. Using only his experience as a free-diver and a small, serrated dive blade, Rohrer dove down again and again at depths of 50 to 60 feet for spans of up to two minutes at a time.

    Finally, after about half an hour of careful work and a little bit of support from the couple’s son Kanehoalani and from Jon Sprague, a wildlife control manager for Pûlama Lâna»i, the shark was free.

   Then the family’s 15-year-old daughter, Ho’ohila, swam the 150-pounds worth of rope to shore.

   “It’s a family story,” says Kapua.