Paris Olympics Surfing Semifinal Surprisingly Interrupted by Whale Breaching Water

Olympic surfers were having a whale of a time in Tahiti on Monday, as a whale in search of its gold medal moment in Paris decided to interrupt competition on the waters off the French Polynesian island.

During a surfing semifinal competition, as Brazilian surfer Tatiana Weston-Webb and Costa Rica’s Brisa Hennessy paddled off in pursuit of the next wave, a whale, a safe distance away from the two surfers, suddenly decided to breach the water, providing the two athletes, the spectators and any photographers there a moment they will likely never forget.

Check out footage of the moment, courtesy of NBC’s Olympics and Paralympics’ account on X, formerly Twitter.

Perhaps the whale was making the case for breaching the water to be an Olympic sport. In all seriousness, kudos to Agence France-Presse photographer Jerome Brouillet, who already captured one of the best photographs of the Paris Games with his shot of Brazil’s Gabriel Medina celebrating a historic surf. Well, Brouillet has done it again.

As for the surfing, Hennessy narrowly missed out on a medal while Weston-Webb took silver. American surfer Caroline Marks took home the gold medal.