A great white shark in blue water beneath a group of divers: a video by Producciones Maldisub documents an unusual encounter at Princess Alice Bank off the Azores. The filmmaker dates the dive to 21 July 2024 and names Norberto Diver as the operator involved. According to this account, the footage was filmed during a trip from the island of Faial.
In the linked sequence, starting at about 1:38, the shark can be seen in the deeper blue water below the divers. It swims through the frame among the fish. The perspective makes the encounter striking but does not allow a reliable estimate of size. The channel identifies the animal as a great white shark; the description gives neither its length nor its sex.
Sighting already reported in July 2024
The encounter can also be placed in context chronologically: on 24 July 2024, RTP AƧores reported footage of a great white shark at Princess Alice Bank, around 45 miles south of Faial. According to the broadcaster, a dive guide working for a Faial-based company had filmed the animal. RTP described such an observation in Azorean waters as rare.
The YouTube film was published on 21 October 2024. Its publication date therefore differs from the date of the dive. The contemporary RTP report supports the account of a great white shark sighting at this location in July; however, the short accompanying text alone does not establish whether the broadcaster used exactly the same footage.
A dive site far out in the Atlantic
Princess Alice Bank, known in Portuguese as Banco Princesa Alice, is a seamount far from the islands’ coastlines. The video description places it off Faial and Pico. The film shows an open-water dive with fish and rays, the animals many divers associate with this site.
Politically, the Azores belong to Portugal; geographically, the encounter took place in the middle of the North Atlantic. It is therefore not a record from the Mediterranean or immediately off mainland Portugal. For interpreting footage like this, the specific dive site is more informative than a broad headline such as āGreat white shark in Europeā.
What the footage shows ā and what remains unknown
The video’s value lies in the documented encounter. It provides no basis for inferring a regularly present group of great white sharks, a growing population or a climate-driven change in their distribution. Nor would the sources available here support calling it the first record for the Azores.
For divers, the scene is a reminder of how unpredictable encounters in the open ocean can be. The footage documents a sighting; neither the video description nor the RTP report explains why this individual appeared or where it went afterwards.
