Aussie couple stumble upon 'once-in-a-lifetime' river scene: 'Noise was unreal'

Yahoo

4 days ago

A travelling couple who ditched their 9-to-5 jobs to explore one of Australia's most remote regions has captured 'amazing' footage of a 'once-in-a-lifetime' scene in the middle of a river.
Dean and Trine, who have spent the past few months working at a caravan park in Kununurra, in far north Western Australia, were enjoying a leisurely drive on their day off last month when they decided to make a detour.
'We were just driving along and saw this boat ramp sign and went, let's just go down there and have a look,' Dean told Yahoo News on Tuesday.
After pulling into the Mambi Island boat ramp, located on the Ord River, the former council worker and his wife, who document their adventures online, jumped out of the car and cautiously scanned the water.
It was then they witnessed a 'big jaw' suddenly emerge further downstream. After bolting back to the vehicle and retrieving his drone, Dean was shocked to see what had made the commotion — a group of hungry crocodiles snacking on a deceased cow.
'We counted six, but I'm thinking there were more than that because you could see shadows underneath [the cow] as well, moving around. And you can see fish buzzing around there, trying to get pieces of meat as well,' he explained.
Crocodiles make 'unreal' noises as they share snack
While his drone was unable to record the noises the predators made as they furiously rolled the dead animal, Dean described them as 'unreal' — even from 250 metres away.
'For us to come across that was just a total fluke, that's for sure,' he said.
The incredible footage, which has since gone viral, shows several crocs splashing in the water as they rip chunks of flesh from the carcass. While he was expecting them to battle it out for who got to claim the prize, Dean said the crocodiles all appeared to be taking turns in sharing the snack.
'There's no shortage of food for them up here. They're all big, fat crocs,' the traveller said, adding he had seen about 20 wallabies sitting on the edge of a riverbank in the same area just days ago.
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Crocs focus on eating, not fighting over large carcasses
David McMahon, a tour guide in the Northern Territory, told Yahoo that when it comes to large carcasses such as this, crocodiles tend to 'focus more on the eating and less on the fighting'.
'I've seen this many times in Australia with saltwater crocs and Africa with Nile crocs. If there is enough food to go around then there is no advantage to fighting each other over a big feed,' he explained.
'It's likely that a very big crocodile took the cow and may have protected it for a while until he had his fill, and then it's more of a free-for-all.'
Crocodiles have been a prominent feature in the news recently, with wild footage of a 4WD driver getting 'bogged on a crocodile' at Cahills Crossing making headlines overseas last week.
On Saturday, Yahoo published striking images of one of the predator's taking a meal on a seven-kilometre ride in Far North Queensland. The scene was captured by crocodile expert David White on the Daintree River.
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