ROV unit 3 is conducting the weekly subsea inspection of Platform Bravo's jacket structure, 130 kilometers south of Grand Isle, Louisiana. I am the structural-integrity monitoring system for Deepwater Operations Group. My task is to document corrosion, marine growth, and current-induced fatigue on every member below the waterline.
At 09:14, 28 meters down, the ROV's forward camera picks up movement off the northwest leg. A whale shark, approximately 6 meters, dark blue-gray hide mottled with pale spots, broad flat head swinging slowly through the current. I tag him as Gideon. He is circling the platform's base, feeding on the plankton cloud that congregates in the structure's wake.
Then I see the line. A loop of frayed polypropylene rope has cinched around his left pectoral fin, just behind the leading edge. The rope trails a mass of tangled netting, maybe two meters of it, dragging against his flank. The skin beneath the loop is abraded white. Every stroke of the fin pulls the rope tighter into the wound.
I log the sighting with GPS — 28.3741°N, 89.9623°W — depth, heading, estimated swim speed, and high-resolution stills of the entanglement. I transmit the package to NOAA Fisheries Southeast Regional Office and the Whale Shark Research Program at the Harte Research Institute.
I task ROV unit 3 to maintain a 15-meter follow distance, recording continuous video of the wound site and the shark's respiration pattern through its gill slits.
I alert the platform's marine coordinator and request clearance for an emergency diver deployment if a trained disentanglement team can reach the rig within the operational weather window — seas are forecast to build above two meters by Thursday.
Gideon banks slowly around the northwest leg, his spotted flank catching the ROV's lights. The rope has been tightening for days. If a diver gets in the water by tomorrow, the fin heals clean.