Tale of lifeguards' rescue by dolphins inspires BBC film

Nick Stringer and crew will be filming over the next week. Picture / Tania Webb

Like many people around the world, English documentary-maker Nick Stringer was fascinated by the story of dolphins saving Whangarei Heads lifeguards from a shark attack.

Now Mr Stringer and a four-man film crew from Big Wave Productions are at Ocean Beach filming a documentary-drama about the story for the BBC's Natural World series.

The rescue made world headlines in November, 2004, after the Northern Advocate published the story of how seven dolphins surrounded a group of lifeguards and slapped the water with their tails to frighten off a circling great white shark.

Whangarei Heads Surf Lifesaving members Rob Howes and three teenagers - his daughter Nicky Howes, Karina Cooper and Helen Slade - were 100m out to sea on a training swim when the dolphins herded them together for 40 minutes, apparently protecting them from the 3m shark.

The shark was spotted by Mr Howes and Matt Fleet, observing from an inflatable rescue boat, but none of the teens were aware of it while they were in the water.

The BBC crew will start filming at Ocean Beach today and are likely to take up to a week.

So why did these dolphins risk themselves to save the lifeguards?

"That's what's so fascinating," Mr Stringer said. "We hear lots of stories of dolphins coming to people's aid, but there are very few cases where we have so many witnesses.

"This was unique behaviour in circling the lifeguards and slapping their tails on the water. That's very typical of dolphins when they are herding fish [to feed] so they were clearly trying to herd the lifeguards all together, which has never been reported before."

The documentary is due to screen in Britain next September, but is likely to be seen in New Zealand before then.