Observations

I am very interested in shark observations from Thailand. Especially I keep an eye on the Blacktipped Reefsharks at Phi Phi, something I've been doing since 1989.
I would be happy to hear from you if you recently have been to Thailand and seen sharks. The sightings and observations from visitors on this website will be published here on the site, so that everyone can benefit from the up-to-date shark situation in Thailand. Blacktips from Hin Phae, Phi Phi Dorn will participate in Photo ID

Frederik Jurriaanse, December 2009, Koh Phi Phi: I saw a number of leopard sharks, lazily asleep on sandy spots, and 1 swimming in a very graceful manner.

Andy Barlow, UK writes: November 2007. On several dives off Koh Bida Nai we saw 3 leopard sharks, spent nearly 10 minutes with them, got some pics of us within 2m of one of them. Also an Eagle ray and 2 turtles. Amazing!!

Hans Brandt writes: Bida Nai Island, 22'nd of November 2005. During a dive trip two leopard sharks (their sizes are difficult to estimate but approx. 1,5 - 2 meters) passed by me, my friend Sak (local PP guy) and a friend from Switzerland. Sak had his UW-camera with him and got 2 shots of each shark. The sharks passed by within 5 meters of distance around 8-10 meters of depth.

Fiona Davies writes: April 2004. One mid-sized leopard shark was spotted in Hideaway Bay in the Similan Islands, resting on the bottom at about 30 metres.

Karin Koch Nielsen observed in the beginning of February 2004 two fine leopard sharks at Bida Islands, Phi Phi.

Michael og Dorthe Heeris: November 2003, Hin Phae, Koh Phi Phi Don. A nice adult Leopard Shark was resting on the bottom.

Hanne T. Bang and husband: Early January 2003. Phi Phi Islands. A 1,5 m Leopard Shark at 13 meters of water.

Fiona Davies: April 2004. A juvenille (1.2m) nurse shark was seen free swimming on a night dive in Princess Bay, Similan Islands, in 8 metres of water. She was probably out hunting, but she was very wary of the divers.

Fiona Davies: June 2004. During a dive at Chumphon Pinnacle (north west of Koh Tao) there were 3 or 4 large Grey Reef Sharks circling divers at around 30m, although they would not come closer than about 10 m away. They moved so quickly I was unable to get any good photographs.

Lars Bindholt: June/July 2010, Hin Phae and Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Dorn: Many blacktips although the conditions this year with a lot of rain and poor visibility. Up to 6 at the same time. Using ph oto-ID I have identified 41 individuals of which 10 were males. 22 sharks was sharks seen earlier years. 19 sharks were not identified before. 23 sharks from last year were not seen again this year. 3 females had fresh bite marks from mating. I observed both pregnant females and juveniles. The population still looks good.

Bob Degener: January 2010: This week I have been diving off Ko Phi Phi Leh (divesite Palong) a few times. There are plenty of blacktips to spot at this site and on my last dive we saw a very unfortunate shark with a large piece of rope or fishing-net around its tail. Although the debris was quite a lot, It seemed that it didn't bother the shark very much at all.

Frederik Jurriaanse: December 2009, Off Long Beach I encountered a number of black tip sharks in quite shallow water. I am always amazed about their streamlined speed and their beautiful perfect bodies! I also saw a turtle slowly working its way up a reef wall.

Bob Degener, November 2009, Koh Phi Phi Dorn, Long Beach:: Early november 2009 I saw up to 2 big blacktip reefsharks on multiple occasions off Ko Phi Phi's Long Beach. Conditions were not very good (visibility was really bad). To make matters worse I only saw them in two feet of water so it was almost too shallow to swim. Maybe I picked the wrong time of the day (usually early afternoons).
They avoided deeper clearer water behind the rock so unfortunately I don't have (good) pictures.
They were definitely more shy than the blacktips you can encounter off Shark Beach (at Koh Tao).
I'm lucky enough to visit Thailand again in January so I'll try it again.

Lars Bindholt: July 2009, Hin Phae and Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Dorn: A lot of blacktipped reefsharks. One time more than 20 was circling me. I didn't have time to count them, but it was really nice. Using photo ID I registered 37 different individuals, 7 of which were males. 16 individuals is sharks from earlier years. 20 sharks from 2008 were not seen this year. 21 sharks were sharks not seen before. Again this year there were both mature pregnant females and small youngsters at 40-50 cm. The population still looks healthy.

Frederik Jurriaanse: Start April 2009, Hin Phae and Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Dorn: Saw lots of blacktips snorkelling off Long Beach!

Lars Bindholt: July 2008, Hin Phae and Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Dorn: Real many blacktipped reefsharks. Using photo-ID I could register 45 different individuals. Of these at least 7 were males. I saw more than 15 at the time in one occasion. I didn't have time to finish my counting. Sizes were from new born 40 cm to big adults at 1,6 m. One of the males had a fishing hook in his mouth. Two of the big females had fresh scars and bruises from recent maiting.

Arne Koch Nielsen says: March 2008, Hin Phae and Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Dorn: Many blacktips on the snorkel dives. As many as 18 at the same time, big and small together. This is the most ever so far.

Dave Thomas, Southport England: Maya Bay February 2008
After a few stints of snorkelling off Long Beach with no sightings of sharks. By chance whilst at Maya Bay, a small Black Tipped Reef swam away from me. It was only about 1 metre in length, but for my first
sighting of a shark it was amazing.

Andy Barlow, UK writes: My partner and I visited Phi Phi in November 2007. We were told Long Beach was the best place to stay by a dive guide we meet on Phuket, if we wanted some amazing diving and snorkelling. He wasn't wrong. Here he said we could snorkell with black tips. After a few unsucessful attempts we went out one afternoon, about 100 metres from the beach and came across 5-6 black tips in water only 2-3 meters deep. Sharks from 0.5m to 1.5m We had more sucessful sightings over the next few days.

Lars Henrik Larsen, Århus writes: July 29, 2007, Sharks Point, Long Beach, Phi-Phi: At least 15 blacktips in very shallow water was circling us for several minutes before they took off again. We only saw the sharks this one time in spite of several trips to the corals in this area.

Lars Bindholt: July 2007, Hin Phae and Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Dorn: Many blacktipped reef sharks. 23 different individuals could be identified by Photo ID. On top of that, there were also a couple of males. There were up to14 sharks at the same time. Big and small were seen, but the majority were small and by far the most were females. There were some windy days with murky and moving waters. During this period the sharks were not to be found.

Arne Koch Nielsen reports: April 2007, Hin Phae and Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Dorn: Quite a few blacktips. We saw many on every snorkel dive no matter what time of day. We saw up to 11 individuals at a time. On the east side of Hin Phae, where it is a little deeper, we were able to follow the sharks a while, swimming among the corals.

Lars Bindholt: June-July 2006, Hin Phae and Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Dorn: Many blacktipped reefsharks. Sharks on every snorkel dive. Up to 10 at a time and at least 25 different individuals (3 males and 22 females). There were small (0,5 m) and big (1,5 m) sharks. The sharks were not very shy, but lost interest in me vere quickly.

Lars Bindholt: June-July 2005, Hin Phae and Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Dorn: Many Blacktipped reefsharks on almost every snorkel dive. Up to 6 at a time and at least 12 different individuals. Had a great time following a small (0,5 m) female more than 30 minuttes on her way around the reef.

Arne Koch Nielsen: March 2005, Hin Phae and Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Don: On a week of daily snorkling we saw a lot of blacktips every time. At least 9 different individuals and up to 9 at a time. It seems as if the blacktips are doing really well.

Lars Bindholt: 4 - 9 July 2004, Hin Phae and Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Don: Blacktipped Reefshark every day. Up to 4 at a time and at least 8 different individuals. Males and females (a coupple of pregnant females) and some small juveniles.

23. April 2004 7.15 – 8.00 AM we ( 2 adults and 3 children of 6, 12 og 15 år) werw out snorkeling near Hin Phae, Phi Phi Island, and all of us saw sharks. We believe that we saw at least 5 different individuals and everybody had minimum 2 observations!

24. March 2004, Surin Islands. Lars Bindholt and Søren Sattrup saw at a single snorkel dive, 4 times blacktipped reefsharks. Certainly 2 different specimens, mayby 4.

Long Beach, Koh Phi Phi Don. February 2004. John and Karin Koch Nielsen saw blacktipped reefsharks on every snorkel dive. Many, at least 6 different.

Snorkeling at Koh Rok 17. jan 2004 aprox 2. p.m. a smaller blacktipped reefshark (1 m) passed me in the opposite direction, very fast and not looking at me at all. It looked very busy.

René Keller and Arne Koch Nielsen 19-23 December 2003 Thailand Koh Phi Phi Don: All blacktip reef shark observations are on the south side of the reef at Long Beach. We went snokeling many time each day but we only saw sharks early morning and just before sunset. It is my experience (4 holidays) that it is early morning the sharks are most currious and will come closer to you and are less shy. One morning I was all alone and lying very quiet in the water, I had the pleasure of having a single shark (size 1,5 m) very close, about 1 meter from me when it was closest. It circled me many times and I began to move my fins slightly to show it that I was alive. Then the current picked me up, and while drifting, the shark followed me close for 60 seconds before it dissappeared. Great experience! Next morning there were also plenty of sharks passing by. 40-50 observations of at least 7 different individuals. Probably more. I saw 6 big ones (1,3 - 1,6 m) at the same time and then a small one. PS: Be carefull in the, once in a while, heavy current.

Michael og Dorthe Heeris: November 2003. Hin Phae, Koh Phi Phi Don: Up to 8 sharks at the same time. The shark population seemed to be in good shape.

Lars Bindholt: 7-15 july 2003. Hin Phae og Haad Yaaw (Long Beach), Koh Phi Phi Don. Every day: Blacktipped Reefsharks. I was snorkeling and saw up to 9 sharks at the time. At least 12 different individuals. Mostly it was adult females but also a few males and one new born baby.

Hanne T. Bang and husband: Early January 2003. Phi Phi Islands. A small 30 cm Blacktipped Reefshark.

Arne Koch Nielsen: December 2002. Hin Phae, Koh Phi Phi Don. On every snorkel dive in more than e week in mid December did Arne observe Blacktipped Reefsharks. Big adults and small juveniles. At least 5 different individuals was seen. Probably more.

26.march, 2004 Surin Islands. Søren Sattrup and Lars Bindholt observed on a snorkel dive a big whitetipped reefshark (female), which was swimming slowly around above the corals at 6-7 meters of depth.

Mads Frese. January 2010: Some more news from Koh Tao. We are still seeing bull sharks every day at Chumphon Pinnackle, both grown-ups and juveniles, so it's super to see several generations. A good sign.
18.01.10 25 meter down. We dived aprox. 30 meters from the reef and 5 big beautiful bull sharks came and surrounded us. They followed us all the way up to 14 meters of depth. Fantastic dive. They came very close, about 1 meters distance between them and us. The sharks were about 3 meters plus. Big and beautifull.

Mads, Divemaster on Koh Tao.

Mads Frese November 2009: Hi. The whole of November 2009 there has almost every day been seen bull sharks at Chumporn, Koh Tao. They messure 2-3,5 meters in length and are mostly seen 2 and 4 together, so they are deffinitely back.

Sam Fysh writes June 2009: Unfortunatley I have some bad news to report. The bull sharks at Chumporn are rumoured to have been fished out. I dove with them several times in Oct-Nov 2007 and having studied some of the footage and compared it to reference material on the internet, I have no doubt that they were bull sharks. I had hoped that I would be able to see them again on a regular basis as I now live in Thailand, unfortunatley in April I headed down to Koh Tao and every single dive shop I went to said that there had been no sightings for over 6 months. These were the first sharks I had ever dived with after a life long obsession with sharks so its a real loss.

In the 2002/2003 season the dive companies in Phuket have seen very few whale sharks probably because of the killings going on in India to supply the Chinese markets with shark meat and fins. Repports of whale shark sightings at Hin Daeng in July 2003

Frederik Jurriaanse: 21. march 2002, Hin Dot at the entrence to Don Sai Bay, Koh Phi Phi Don.
Frederik, who after the tsunami is the chairman of Phi Phi Aid, was lucky enough to dive with a 7 meter whale shark for no less than 66 minutes.

May-June-July 2010: Massive coral bleaching around Phuket and Phi Phi and other places in The Andaman Sea due to very hot weather in May. At Phi Phi at least 80% of the corals are dead.

January 2010: The bull sharks at Chumporn Pinnackle are back after 6 months of no sightings.

2006: Phi Phi Hill Resort on Long Beach, Phi Phi is neglecting the fact that Phi Phi is a national park. It has made the eastern end of Long Beach into a building site and totally stripped the hill side so that the barren earth is exposed for erosion. On top of that they have build, using rocks from the hill side, a small harbour in the narrow strait between Hin Phae and the island. This having an impact on watercirculation and silt from the hill choking the corals.

2006: Unfortunately the staff on the resorts on Long Beach are still catching baby blacktips. In July they just caught two for eating. Let us all make them understand, that this is a very bad idea.