Burly Maui Realtor's Feat of Endurance Cut Short by Mini Shark

The Maui News had a front page article on Maui Realtor Mike Spalding this morning. Spalding is an elite distance swimmer who was trying to join the very select ranks of swimmers who have crossed the wild and woolly Alenuihaha channel between the Big Island and Maui. The channel crossing is almost 30 miles in length! To date only two other swimmers have made this crossing successfully. Mike was trying to do it at the ripe old age of 61. Pretty impressive to say the least. According to the Maui News, Spalding was 11 miles into the swim when he felt a sharp pain in his sternum followed by a sharp pain in his calf. A support kayak came to his aid when they heard Spalding cry out in pain. Inspection of the wounds when he was on the support kayak revealed two small bites. The wounds were not life threatening, but more than enough to put an end to his crossing attempt. Spalding suspects that the perpetrator was a cookie cutter shark.

Cookie Cutter sharks are a species that usually targets open ocean pelagic fish like Tuna. They stay in the depths of the ocean during the day rising to the surface to hunt at night. When I looked the fish up on Wikipedia, to date the only documented negative human interaction with cookie cutters has been when the shark has damaged American military underwater sonar equipment. There was no mention of any attacks on humans.

Judging by the article in the paper, Mike wasn't phased at all by the shark bites. Instead, he was dissapointed that he had to abort what to that point had been a very good swim. I have had the opportunity to show some of Mike's listings before. He is quite a character. I wish him a speedy recovery. I have no doubt he will be back in the water soon training to cross the channel.