Marine researchers capture rare video of great white shark off coast of Rhode Island

Scientists have captured what they say is rare video footage of a great white shark in the waters off the coast of Rhode Island.

Great whites aren't uncommon in the waters of the Northeast, but they mostly congregate around Cape Cod, where a preferred source of prey -- the grey seal -- tends to be as well, Jon Dodd, executive director of the Atlantic Shark Institute, told ABC News.

Marine researchers had been getting reports of a dead 40-foot humpback whale floating near Block Island, about 13 miles off the southern coast of mainland Rhode Island, Dodd said. When he and Sarah Callan, manager of animal rescue at Mystic Aquarium in Connecticut, finally found the whale, they saw something unusual for the area: an 8-foot juvenile white shark feeding on the carcass.

The white shark appeared about 10 minutes after they arrived, first as a shadow that went underneath the whale. Once the shadow emerged from the other side, the researchers knew they were witnessing something special.

"It was a really good day for both of us," Dodd said.

The video captures the shark moving in an undulating way, indicating that it was in feeding mode, Dodd said.

It is unclear what sex the shark was, but it appeared healthy and was not tagged, Dodd said.

Callan was also able to take tissue samples of the whale for further research, according to the institute. The whale washed up on Block Island's Crescent Beach days later, and researchers were able to perform a full necropsy on it. The cause of death has yet to be determined.

White sharks aren't completely unknown in Rhode Island waters, but they aren't sighted much, Dodd said.

Last year, a baited remote underwater video system, which was placed in a cage and dropped into the ocean, captured a white shark swimming by.

But until now, one had never been documented so closely by humans in the region, Dodd said.

"He was camera shy initially, but then came by and gave us a close-up view," he said.

The encounter is rare because the vast majority of sub-adult and adult sharks end up at Cape Cod, Dodd said. But the younger ones are ending up in Rhode Island during the summer more often as shark populations rebound in the Atlantic, Dodd said.

"It's kind of amazing that you know these white sharks are few and far between," he said. "We see them, but not ever in large numbers."