marksm 0 Posted September 9, 2010 (edited) Book 'em Danno: Kleptomaniac Manta Mugs Cameraman - What began as another exhilarating manta ray night dive off Kailua-Kona, Hawaii on an August evening in 2010, quickly turned into the theft of the century. Cameraman Travis Matteson was capturing footage for the scuba diving travel television show "Into the Drink" aboard the Kona Aggressor II. Suddenly, one of the manta's cephalic lobes hooked his lighting system, and darted off with the nearly $10,000 worth of gear. Underwater videographer Johnny Reidt caught the entire theft on camera, and the manta, carrying the stolen rig, captured some amazing footage of the nighttime reef. Remarkably, the camera rig was found completely intact after an eight-minute run by the manta, just yards from the dive boat. Case closed. The video can be seen here on Into The Drink's youtube channel Let me add a note for those who care like we do at Into the Drink about our marine environment. As the DOP on this shoot, I was there and Travis was obviously shooting the school of small fish and had his attention on them at the moment the manta decided to swim at his lights and hooked the light cable. Travis is the most heartfelt, mindful person for the environment and the sea life I have ever met. His first thought was of the manta not getting hurt by this when he came up, even with a $10,000 rig out on the ocean floor. At NO time does any of the film crew do anything harmful to the marine life that provides us with our passion and our livelihood. If one of the cameramen did so intentionaly, they would be fired on the spot. I encourage you to look as this freak occurrence for what it was. A freak occurance we can only laugh at now. We thought the manta night dive in Hawaii was amazing. It caught all of us off guard with the quantity and quality of the experience. When the Hawaii episode airs, we hope that all the great operators, who share the Manta's waters each night, will benefit from the exposure. More plankton for the mantas please. Edited September 10, 2010 by marksm Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest echeng Posted September 9, 2010 Embedded: Exciting footage, but... poor manta! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
HDVdiver 16 Posted September 14, 2010 http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-501465_162-20016206-501465.html Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
jonny shaw 16 Posted September 15, 2010 http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-501465_162-20016206-501465.html Brilliant!!! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Beach Bum 0 Posted September 15, 2010 That is awesome!! A Manta with an eye for photography! Mike Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Scubamoose 0 Posted September 15, 2010 Incredible!! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Steve Douglas 16 Posted October 2, 2010 Just stumbled on this post. Got to come here more often....just amazing stuff. Unreal and that he got his gear back undamaged is just as amazing, did you see how close to the bottom floor that was. Shocked that it wasn't scraped all over the place. Steve Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
james 0 Posted October 3, 2010 Wait until you guys see the video of the manta that made off w/ the ROV! Cheers James Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rud-gr 0 Posted October 12, 2010 So, is the wise lesson not to use a tethered camera? Not sure if I'm comfortable with that but seeing this footage.... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Steve Douglas 16 Posted October 27, 2010 My friend. Bob Gladden, was out filming and sent me this frame of video. I always knew mermaids existed. Steve Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Scubamoose 0 Posted October 27, 2010 I always knew mermaids existed. Offcourse they do Steve! I live with one Hey where and when can we see the whole video Bob made? The snapshot surely got me interested.. Cheers Karel Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
