In the video below, which was originally uploaded to YouTube in May, a man on a beach appears to perform an impromptu C-section on a dead, pregnant blacktip shark, giving her three unborn shark pups a second chance at life.
According to the original video's description, which does not mention when or where filming took place, the shark was dead when it washed up on the beach, but there appeared to be something moving inside it. The footage shows a man knifing open the dead shark, revealing three live babies wiggling inside. After carving a long v-shaped incision in the mother's underbelly, the man nervously reaches for the squirming pups and throws them one by one into the ocean.
WARNING: Footage is graphic.
The original video's uploader did not immediately respond to The Huffington Post's request for comment, and it's unclear if the newborns successfully swam away after being tossed back into the water.
Kim Holland, lead researcher for the University of Hawaii's HIMB Shark Research Group, told The Huffington Post that their chance at survival depends on how close their mother was to full term.
A similar incident occurred earlier this year, when a group of Florida fishermen caught a pregnant 12-foot hammerhead shark that had an apparent bite mark in its stomach, with the tail of a hammerhead pup poking out. The fishermen ended up delivering 20 pups from the mother and returning them to the sea.
Some sharks, according to Holland's research, are capable of inducing birth "at the last second" when they sense they are in extreme danger or are nearing mortality, in order to give their pups a better chance at survival.
At this point, we can only hope there are three more sharks in the sea who can thank a quick-thinking, knife-wielding man for their lives.
H/T The Inertia
Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/12/05/dead-pregnant-shark-gives-birth_n_6266352.html?utm_hp_ref=weird-news&ir=Weird+News and provided by entertainment-movie-news.com
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