'Lucky' reason Aussie avoided death after being hit by whale
Jason Breen, 55, was sure he was going to die when he saw the whale get bigger and bigger – but a miracle saved his life.
Jason Breen has no doubt he is "lucky to be alive" after he was hit by a whale while sailboarding off the coast of northern Sydney on Wednesday morning.
"I saw the whale come up to my right and it started to come out of the water and get bigger and bigger. I thought, 'I'm in trouble. I'm in real trouble'," he told Yahoo News Australia about his experience near Mona Vale Beach.
"It was such a big mass. You have no control of pushing back and it just pushed me down deep."
Being struck by a whale like this is highly unlikely, but surviving the ordeal even more so. Mr Breen strongly believes he only lives to tell the tale because his equipment broke.
"I was lucky that my leg rope snapped, it allowed me to get back to the surface. Otherwise, I would've just been dragged down and I'd be gone," he said.
Aussie mates didn't believe sailboarder's story
Mr Breen managed to get himself back to shore and was visibly shaken by the incident, but his friends thought he was "pulling their leg".
"I came in and told two mates and I said, 'Look I've just been hit by a whale and I'm a bit in shock,'" he said. "But being Australian, you know, they've turned around and didn't believe me. They didn't even give me the time of day," he joked.
It was only after he went home and sifted through GoPro footage that his friends took him seriously, with the entire collision caught on camera.
"They 100 per cent owe me a drink," he said.
Shocked witness captured the collision from shore
Mona Vale resident Paul Nettelbeck was out enjoying a coastal walk before work when he spotted "very active" whales breaching the water's surface and decided to get his phone out to record.
He never could have imagined the "one in a million" chance of recording one of the whale's collide with Mr Breen.
"I'm filming and he [the sailboarder] went past before he turned around. As he goes past, the whale comes out and lands on him. I immediately stopped filming, I thought I'd just watched someone die," he told Yahoo News.
After desperately calling for emergency help, he spotted Mr Breen back on his board and was in utter shock, especially after hearing about another Sydney man who died last month after a whale collided with his boat.
"Because Jason was in the water, that saved him. He would have been squashed if it had been a flat surface [like on a boat]," he said.
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The two men have since bonded over the "rare" incident and Mr Breen admitted he will test his luck again in the weekend's upcoming lottery.
"Everyone said you should go and buy a lottery ticket and my wife last night went out and got some lottery numbers."
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