Nearly 14-foot-long white shark found swimming off Jacksonville’s Coast

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A nearly 1700-pound white shark was tracked swimming off the coast of Jacksonville Thursday Morning.

Meet Contender. Weighing in at 1653 pounds and measuring 13 feet, 9 inches, Contender is breaking some records.

According to OCEARCH, he is the largest male white shark ever caught, tagged, released and studied by the organization in the Northwest Atlantic.

>>> STREAM ACTION NEWS JAX LIVE <<<

[DOWNLOAD: Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks]

The adult shark was first tagged by OCEARCH on January 17th, 45 miles off the Florida-Georgia coast.

Contender was named in honor of Contender Boats, a longtime OCEARCH partner, whose sport fishing and pleasure boats enable the non-profit’s research missions. OCEARCH says “their commitment to performance and innovation is essential to its ability to explore and protect our oceans.”

You can track his journey online with OCEARCH’s Shark Tracker.

The largest shark ever tagged by OCEARCH is still a female named Nukumi.

Nukumi, tagged in Nova Scotia in 2020, was over 17 feet long and over 3500 pounds.

Unfortunately, her tracker stopped pinging to researchers in 2021, so it’s unknown where she is now.

Read: WATCH: Florida deputy rescues massive sunfish stuck on shoreline

Read: Court restores protections for endangered whale species to prevent entanglement in fishing gear

[SIGN UP: Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter]

Click here to download the free Action News Jax news and weather apps, click here to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and click here to stream Action News Jax live.