Apex Shark Expeditions and Chris Fallows have featured on the many shark documentaries on the Natural History Channels with Apex being the first choice for virtually any serious shark orientated documentary in South Africa.
To be able to capture the Great white shark breaching behavior from so many different angles has meant much time spent in the field. One of the key successes has however been to make use of extremely valuable information on the Seal Island area and shark behavior that the Apex Shark Expeditions crew have recorded over the last 21 years.
This show captured the first ever breaching shark footage from Australia as well as Ano Nuevo Island and also for the first time showed Great whites attacking decoys from underwater. One of the biggest headaches for the crew was the wait for sharks in Australia. During the three weeks in South Australia only three sharks were seen.
Equipped with state of the art cameras specially designed to capture the ocean’s top predator from new perspectives, the team embarked on their latest quest to seek out one shark in particular, a 14-foot Great white known as Colossus. A flat calm Seal Island day, soft golden pink light kissing the Hottentots Holland Mountains as the last rays of sun said goodbye. It was literally seconds before calling it a day and going home and then WHOOSH! a huge Great white launched vertically behind Jeff, it was Colossus, mouth agape and in full hunting mode, what an incredible end to the day and the shoot and a shot that was jawsome.
Colossus is missing in action and Chris Fallows and Jeff Kurr team up in search of the huge male Great white shark. This time Jeff had designed a one-man cage, the WASP which Chris could walk around on the seafloor much the same way Fred Flintstone walked around with a tortoise shell on his back. Another highlight was the manned floatation device called Parthenope that Dickie Chivell and Jeff Kurr designed. It resembled a large 15ft long female white shark and came complete with moving parts that could be steered and moved by Dickie whilst lying on it. The idea was to attract a huge male white shark to come and have a look at the female. We managed to get Dickie in the water on the Parthenope and sure enough we started getting the attention of several sharks.
If a Great white shark and an Orca had to do battle, who would win? Three Great white shark carcasses are washed ashore in the Gansbaai area. All three sharks were large animals and had missing livers. In late June a fourth large Great white shark was found on a Gansbaai beach, also with a missing liver. It was now crystal clear that something was intentionally killing Air Jaws…
Chris Fallows and Jeff Kurr follow the path of destruction of the two Orca, Port and Starboard’s dirty work along the Southern Cape beaches. Marine biologist, Alison Towner becomes the centre of the unfolding mystery as she performs dissections on all the deceased sharks. She begins to find clues and disturbing information behind these mysterious events begins to unravel.
Three research teams—led by shark expert Chris Fallows, marine biologists Alison Towner and Dr Enrico Gennari dive to gauge how many Great white sharks are in Mossel Bay. This area became a hot spot for “Air Jaws” after killer orcas decimated their numbers in 2017 and scared them off their traditional hunting grounds in South Africa. With overfishing of their prey (smaller sharks) and climate change presenting additional threats, researchers worry Mossel Bay may be the last place to see sharks fly along the country’s coastline—which was once home to an estimated 1,000 great whites.
The Air Jaws team returns to Seal Rock to capture the highest breach ever recorded. Rocket Shark holds the record at 15-feet.
It’s a great white shark face off! Sharks are competing for the highest jump, looking at their speed and the all-important hangtime to determine the winner.
In the “Air Jaws” specials, he goes to great extremes to capture footage of sharks breaching. The craziest thing he has done to get the right shot is being towed behind a vessel on a seal sled to get a seal’s view of what it is like to be hunted by a Great White. Chris Fallows has recorded more than 13,000 predatory events, so had a good idea of whether the sled would get hit.
The popularity of the “Air Jaws” series means Chris has practically become the human face of Discovery’s Shark Week.