NSW fishermen film ‘once in a lifetime’ close encounter with whales

Three fishermen have filmed their surprisingly close encounter with humpback whales in Gosford on the NSW Central Coast.

Ben Sandman, Nathan Bajada and Chris Yu were out on a quiet fishing day last weekend when they spotted four whales making a beeline toward their boat.

Footage shows the whales breaching and swimming around just metres from the men’s boat.

“They were just amazing, they came up and looked around,” Mr Sandman said.

“They were just as interested in us as we were in them.”

Mr Yu said the men were “pretty intimidated” by the 40-tonne whales, but couldn’t pass up the opportunity to hang around and film the huge mammals.