510-Pound Thresher Shark Caught 30 Miles Off Sandy Hook

SEWAREN, NJ — It was the catch of a lifetime. This trio of Staten Island fishermen have been trolling the waters of Raritan Bay and off Sandy Hook for years, but they never expected to catch a 510-pound thresher shark. Yet that's exactly what they reeled in this past Sunday, Aug. 18.

"We try to fish every day that it's nice, every weekend and usually five to six times a week," said Joseph Egitto, 27, who owns the small, 23-foot boat they were on when they caught the giant fish. Egitto was with his buddies, Pat Salvato, 42, and Frank Pomponio, 25, all Staten Island residents and members of the Staten Island Fishing Club.

This past Sunday, as they usually do, the men took the boat out from its dock in Tottenville and headed down the Arthur Kill. As always, they stopped at Dockside Bait and Tackle in Sewaren, where they picked up loads of bunker fish to use as chum.

They were headed to fishing grounds known as Monster Ledge, a point 30 miles east from Sandy Hook in the middle of the Atlantic. It's a very big undersea drop-off, where the ocean floor suddenly plunges from about 120 feet to 260-300 feet deep. It's a fishing spot known for large-sized tuna, bluefish and sharks: Lots and lots of sharks.

"There are big fish out there," said Egitto. They chummed the water with the bloody dead bunk fish and waited.

It was about 12 noon Sunday when the shark hit. The small boat suddenly rocked up and down with the impact.

"You just gotta hold onto that pole for dear life," said Egitto. "I feel like I've aged 20 years just fighting that thing. It could pull you into the water. It took three grown men taking turns to fight that shark. It's literally man versus beast. It's intense."

The men took turns taking the pole while the others rested. At one point, the thresher even jumped out of the water. In the end, after four hours of fighting, it was just a matter of tiring the shark out.

"They come up to the surface when they're ready," he said. "By that point, he was just as exhausted as we were."

However, the thresher shark, at 510 pounds, was too big to be carried in the boat. It could have sunk the boat or one swipe from its tail could have broken a hole in the hull. In the end, the men had to tie it to the side and slowly chug back to shore, at five miles an hour. It took them three hours to return to Dockside Bait and Tackle in Sewaren, where they took these victory photos.

Egitto said he has already filleted the shark, and he eats every fish he catches. He already gave out fillets of the shark to family and friends.

"Yes, I do feel bad killing it and if we catch another one and it's not bigger than 500 pounds we will let him go," the fisherman told Patch. "I really do try to eat everything I catch and I eat a lot of shark."

"We spend hundreds of thousands of dollars a year supporting the fishing industry," he added. "We try to preserve the ocean, we don't try to hurt the ocean. I just want everyone to know that this shark won't go to waste."

He said earlier this August he caught a 275-pound shark and a 420-pound shark. All of the sharks caught, including the 510-pound one, are common thresher sharks, which are not protected.