Sharks Attack Netflix Crew Filming 'Our Planet II': "It Was Like Something Out of Jaws"

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Netflix’s Our Planet is the latest nature series narrated by Sir David Attenborough and it features unprecedented footage of some of nature’s most elusive and dangerous creatures. Retrieving this kind of footage has its risks, however, as the show’s director, Toby Nowlan, explained in a recent interview.

The first episode of Our Planet II, which came out on June 14th, features footage of young albatross chicks learning to fly for the first time. To film this, the crew traveled to the outskirts of the remote Hawaiian island of Laysan. The area is so remote that no film crew had ever filmed there before, and to do so required the crew set up in inflatable rafts where they would wait for nature to take its course. As they awaited the arrival of the albatross hatchlings making their first flight, the crew faced a terrifying shark attack.

“This ’v’ of water came streaming towards us and this tiger shark leapt at the boat and bit huge holes in it,” Nowland said. “The whole boat exploded. We were trying to get it away and it wasn’t having any of it. It was horrific. That was the second shark that day to attack us.”

Nowlan explained that the sharks “were incredibly hungry, so there might not have been enough natural food and they were just trying anything they came across in the water.”

The crew was able to make it the 100 meters back to the shoreline where they were then relocated to a small rubber dinghy, which also proved to not be sturdy enough: That boat was later attacked by giant trevallies, a type of predatory fish that can grow over five feet long. That boat’s motor was knocked out as a result.

The show’s producer, Huw Cordey, added, “The original idea was to do an underwater shoot with the tiger sharks waiting in the shallows at Laysan, but the first day the tiger sharks were around, the crew got into these inflatable boats — and two sharks attacked them. It was like something out of Jaws. The crew was panicked, and basically made an emergency landing on the sand.”

The attacks haven’t deterred Nowlan from swimming with the sharks, however. Today on his Instagram account, he posted a photo of himself underwater, photographing a white-tip shark with the caption, “Feel like sharks could use some better PR right now.”