A 1,009-pound great white shark named Ernst has resurfaced off Newfoundland, Canada, months after disappearing from researchers' trackers.
The 12-foot-long female shark's tracker pinged off Newfoundland on Thursday after traveling thousands of miles along the US East Coast, according to OCEARCH, a non-profit group focused on shark research and ocean conservation. Researchers tagged Ernst on October 4, 2025.
Tracking data showed Ernst moving through the Gulf of Mexico and circling the waters around Florida, then pinging several times around Alabama in January before beginning a lengthy journey north. Researchers said the shark's proximity to shore was notable and fell outside what they typically observe for white sharks in the region.
Her route took her past Georgia and the Carolinas, through waters off Virginia and New Jersey, and toward New England. Ernst then continued northeast past Nova Scotia before entering Canada's Cabot Strait, with her latest ping recorded on July 23 off the southwestern coast of Newfoundland, near the Codroy Valley.
White sharks migrate to the colder waters off Newfoundland and Atlantic Canada during the summer and fall in search of food, following gray and harbor seals into their northern feeding grounds. As seal populations have recovered across the North Atlantic, the sharks have gained access to a growing supply of prey that helps them build the fat reserves needed for their lengthy migrations.
Winter movements in the Gulf
Tracking data suggest the predators are spending increasingly longer periods in the region, with their average stay reportedly rising from 48 to 70 days, and some traveling as far north as the Grand Banks and Cabot Strait. As ocean temperatures fall during winter, the sharks typically head south toward the southeastern US and the Gulf of Mexico in search of warmer waters and other food sources.
During the winter, Ernst's tracker registered 22 detections off southwest Florida before recording additional signals near Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana. At one point, the shark came within approximately four miles of the Alabama coast near Gulf Shores and Dauphin Island, and was also detected around Louisiana's Chandeleur Islands, giving researchers rare insight into this population's movements through the northeastern Gulf.
Researchers said Ernst is one of several sharks helping them understand migration patterns in the Northwest Atlantic, and that these northern pings represent normal seasonal behavior as part of ongoing monitoring efforts.
Contender's separate reappearance
In April, one of the largest great white sharks ever observed in the Atlantic Ocean, a male nicknamed Contender, pinged along the US East Coast. Contender measures 13 feet 9 inches in length and weighs nearly 1,700 pounds.
OCEARCH said Contender reemerged on July 10, when his tracking tag briefly reactivated somewhere near the East Coast. Researchers originally encountered Contender on January 17, 2025, just 45 miles from the Florida-Georgia coast, where they attached a satellite tag to his dorsal fin.
Since then, Contender has traveled thousands of miles, moving north along the coasts of North Carolina, New Jersey and Massachusetts' Cape Cod as he migrated in search of food. Until this month, the shark had not been seen since late April 2026, when OCEARCH determined he had been in waters near North Carolina.
The group said Contender is the largest male white shark it has ever tagged among the North Atlantic population. Scientists now know he is still out there, but the latest signal did not include his exact current location.
