Giant whale nudges paddleboarder in close encounter off Argentina coast

In a rare incident, a friendly giant whale swam right up to a paddleboarder to give her a nudge. The unusual encounter took place off the coast of Puerto Madryn, where a stunning Southern Right whale playfully came closer to a local paddleboarder to give her a push. The video surfaced on the internet about a day ago and has left netizens amazed and thrilled.

As per reports, the whale migration season in Argentina's Patagonia region begins from May and lasts up to December. During this time, these curious mammals sometimes swim up to the shores. However, such human contacts are the rarest of events that thrill everyone, AP mentioned.

Playful nudge caught on video

The video was shot by a drone on Tuesday when the lady surfer was on her paddleboarding session off the coast of Puerto Madryn. The giant Southern Right whale swam towards the tiny paddleboard, (compared to its size) and playfully casually pushed with its right fin. Then it waited and observed the movement of the bright yellow paddleboard while swimming below it. "They are rare moments," Oscar Comes, a local watersports tourism operator told AP. However, such human contacts are something that is prohibited," he added. "It isn't like you can go in a kayak, standup board, a boat, or whatever, to look for the animal," he told. Take a look at the stunning and adorable video:

'I think today I made the best whale drone video of my life.'

"Scary yet wonderous"

The video was uploaded by photographer Maxi Jonas on Twitter. "I think today I made the best whale drone video of my life," Maxi wrote on Twitter in Spanish. The 54-second video of the pleasant unforeseen interaction went immediately viral after it was posted on social media. The video amassed over 2.3 million views and was retweeted over 34k times. It also received over 168k love reactions and nearly 3k comments.

While most were amazed at this rather rare yet lighthearted encounter, many were touched by the whale's gesture. "Love that little, general knowledge from the whale. What a remarkable encounter!" wrote one user. Some users also mentioned how fascinating a whale encounter is. "I want whale watching in Cape Cod a couple of weeks ago, and it was an awesome experience but this looks scary and wonders at the same time," another user wrote.

With inputs from AP

Image: @maxijones/Twitter