Hilton Head charter captain tags another great white shark. Here's why she's a historic catch

Chip Michalove has caught and tagged another great white shark — his seventh catch since December — but this one is special, and a real sweetheart to boot.

The Hilton Head charter captain who has spent the last 13 years of his life on the hunt for the Atlantic’s apex predator.

This weekend, Michalove and his crew at Outcast Sport Fishing tagged a 350-pound, 8-foot juvenile great white shark with a Smart Position and Temperature (SPOT) device off the coast of Hilton Head. That means the shark can be tracked in real time through an app called Sharktivity, powered by the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy.

She’s so special she even has a name — Miss Carolina. And a Twitter account.

“She’s the first great white to be SPOT tagged off the coast of South Carolina, so this is pretty ground-breaking,” Michalove said Tuesday. “It was fitting that we named her Miss Carolina.”

Michalove has tagged five other great whites with acoustic tags that track the animal’s journey through the Atlantic and sends data to the conservancy in Chatham, Mass., where Michalove has teamed with scientists to study great whites and their behavior.

“With SPOT tagging, we get daily data of where this fish is going,” Michalove said. “The acoustic tags are more sporadic with sending information to the scientists.”

SPOT tagging comes with a challenge, though.

Michalove said he has to get up-close and personal with the beastly fish for the tagging to work. He tags the shark while it’s still in the water with a hook in its mouth, which causes minimal stress on the animal, Michalove said.

“You have to actually handle her,” Michalove said. “Instead of attaching the tag with pole, you have to manually install it.”

Miss Carolina was fairly calm throughout the process that took about 20 minutes, according to Michalove.

“She was a sweetheart,” he said. “She took the bait, didn’t show signs of aggression. (She) never went for a hand. Some of them try to take chunks out of the boat. This one wasn’t mad; she just kind of hung out. She was in excellent shape when we let her go.”

Michalove catches sharks for the sake of scientific study, he said, and “would never even think of killing one.” For more than a decade, he tried, failed and tried again and again to catch one.

This season, which started in December when the great beasts are in the area, he’s hooked seven, tagging a great white on every trip.

He says Hilton Head Islanders should not fear the high population of great whites off the coast.

“They really aren’t as aggressive as they’re shown on TV, or maybe it’s just the ones here. They’re slower and methodical,” he said. “They are too intelligent and too picky to think of humans as prey.”

Michalove added that sharks have made their home off the South Carolina coast for millions of years.

“They’ve always been there, but we’re just now hearing about them,” he said. “When I hear people say that these great white shark stories are deterring tourists for coming here, I tell them it attracts 100 more for every ten it deters. People from all over are now interested in our fishing here.”

Miss Carolina is the first shark to be tracked in real-time through the Sharktivity app.

Michalove says his new goal for the season is to tag an even bigger one.

“We’re not even at the halfway point (of the great white season). I’m expecting a couple more monsters, maybe 17 or 18 footers, before spring,” he said. “I want to get some huge, older sharks and compare the difference in activity, see where they go.”

This story was originally published January 24, 2017 at 5:11 PM with the headline "Hilton Head charter captain tags another great white shark. Here's why she's a historic catch."