What killed a 3m great white?

The mysterious death of a 3m great white shark a decade ago prompted a captivating marine documentary filmed off Bremer Bay’s coast.

In 2003, Esperance wildlife cameraman David Riggs filmed a shark being fitted with an electronic tracking tag.

The tag washed up 87 days later and revealed the shark had been ferociously eaten alive.

Riggs became obsessed with finding out what sort of creature could have taken out a 3m-long great white.

His search for answers led him to an area 60km off the coast of Bremer Bay where a mysterious natural phenomenon attracts the ocean’s most fearsome predators for a few short weeks of the year.

The documentary, to air this Sunday night, explains what attracts the “super predators”.

“The Bremer Bay system is pristine … it has not been touched yet,” Riggs said.

“It is like a mini version of the Amazon rainforest in the ocean and also a location of hydrocarbon gas.

“It looks like there could be a link between the hydrocarbon system and this seasonal aggregation of marine life.”

Riggs, who has observed the area each year since 2005 and also surveyed between Albany and Esperance, said what the documentary team witnessed there was “unbelievable”.

“Multiple species gather there … on one day we went through in excess of 100 killer whales in the space of four nautical miles,” he said.

“It’s not just killer whales, there are sperm whales, long-finned pilot whales, huge schools of oceanic sunfish, blue fin tuna, and dozens and dozens of what I think are dusky whaler sharks.

“We documented another species out there which I won’t reveal but it is a main prey item the killer whales are focusing on and it is really remarkable and just mind-boggling.”

The documentary team, which included Perth filmmaker Leighton De Barros, visited Albany in February to take fuel and camera equipment on board before heading out on their first expedition.

“There are huge slicks of phytoplankton you see every year in Albany, Bremer Bay and Esperance visible from a MODIS satellite system,” Riggs said.

“I’ve been looking at those images since 2005 and it looks like at least in part they are gaining nutrition from these deep hydrocarbon systems.”

The Search for the Ocean’s Super Predator airs on Sunday at 7.30pm on ABC1.