#430 - "Eaten Alive" Shark Week Filmmaker on Footage They Can Never Release | Andy Casagrande
Episode of Danny Jones Podcast · September 11, 2026 · 3 h 17 min
Wildlife cinematographer Andy Casagrande tells Danny Jones about filming great whites, near-fatal shark encounters, Shark Week production, and commercial fishing corruption.
Summary
Andy Casagrande described how a childhood fascination with sharks led, by accident, to a career as a wildlife cinematographer. He recounted studying psychology after bouncing between four universities, working in software during the dot-com era, then moving to Cape Town as an unpaid research assistant on a great white population study, where a National Geographic director hired him after hearing a song he had written about great whites. He contrasted National Geographic's self-image with Discovery's Shark Week, which he called "the dark side," while noting that the volume of shark programming made it uniquely attractive to filmmakers.
Much of the conversation covered specific encounters and shoots: filming Mick Fanning shortly after his Jeffreys Bay great white incident, meeting Mark Healey free-diving with a great white at Guadalupe, and objecting privately to Discovery's plan to have Michael Phelps swim at Fish Hoek, a South African beach where two people had been fatally consumed. Casagrande said his wife was nearly decapitated by a tiger shark during a GoPro corporate shoot in the Bahamas, that GoPro staff wanted the footage deleted, and that he has never released it. He also described his own research project using acoustic receivers 30 miles off Naples, where two great whites tagged years apart in Cape Cod and South Carolina registered on the same night within an hour of each other, and speculated they were hunting goliath grouper.
Both men criticized aspects of the fishing industry. Casagrande argued that NOAA's Shark Research Fishery, which he said has issued quotas of up to 200,000 pounds of sandbar shark annually since 2008 and allows fishermen to sell the carcasses, amounts to a federally subsidized fin trade; he said fishermen have threatened his family over his outspokenness. Jones described his own documentary on Gulf commercial fishermen at John's Pass, the individual fishing quota system and its trading by outside investors, and said every subject of that film died within about six years. Other topics included orcas' cultural prey preferences, captivity and Blackfish, John Lilly's dolphin experiments, Greenland sharks, sharks' recently recorded clicking sounds, a theory that orcas home in on acoustic tags, and the story of Casagrande's New Zealand friend Kina Scott, who survived a great white attack while diving for sea urchins.
Casagrande also argued that passion can matter more than credentials, citing Stanford-affiliated great white PhDs who had never seen the animal underwater and Jane Goodall's lack of initial academic training, and said he now views YouTube rather than television as the future of wildlife media.
Chapters
- 1:14
Accidental path into shark filmmaking
Casagrande traces his shark obsession from childhood television through four universities, a software job, and an unpaid research post in Cape Town that led to National Geographic.
- 9:44
Nat Geo versus Shark Week
He compares the two networks' cultures and explains why the volume of shark programming drew him to Discovery.
- 13:15
Filming Mick Fanning and surfing risk
Casagrande recounts being hired by ESPN to shoot Mick Fanning months after his Jeffreys Bay shark encounter, and both men discuss shark risk while surfing.
- 24:33
Habituation, drone footage and dangerous beaches
They discuss whether sharks become habituated to divers, drone footage of sharks near swimmers, and why certain beaches such as Fish Hoek see repeated fatal attacks.
- 42:00
Great whites off Naples and feeding behavior
Casagrande describes his acoustic receiver project 30 miles off Naples, two tagged great whites arriving the same night, and his goliath grouper hypothesis.
- 53:52
The tiger shark and his wife
He recounts the near-decapitation of his wife by a tiger shark during a GoPro shoot and why the footage was never released.
- 1:03:28
Cameras on sharks, Jaws and shark reputation
Casagrande discusses fin-mounted 360 cameras, Ocean Ramsey, the legacy of Jaws, and why sharks' reputation outstrips their actual danger.
- 1:13:21
Fatal Tiger Beach dive and freediving
He describes a fatal tiger shark attack on an Austrian diver in the Bahamas, then his freediving training and a breath-hold car crash.
- 1:27:19
Orcas, captivity and Dolphin Tale
They discuss orca cultural prey specialization, the lack of wild attacks on humans, SeaWorld and Blackfish, and Jones's experience on Dolphin Tale.
- 1:45:49
Commercial fishing, quotas and NOAA
Jones recounts his John's Pass fishing documentary and the IFQ system while Casagrande criticizes NOAA's Shark Research Fishery and shark finning.
- 2:08:38
Crocodiles, Steve Irwin and polar bears
Casagrande discusses a crocodile attack filmed by Mark Rackley, Steve Irwin's death, and his panicked night alone on the sea ice trying to attract polar bears.
- 2:31:32
Credentials, mating behavior and shark communication
He argues passion can outweigh degrees, describes wanting to film great whites mating, and discusses newly recorded shark sounds and orcas tracking tags.
- 2:53:40
Consumptive attacks and Kina Scott's survival
Casagrande recounts a South Australian spearfisherman consumed by a great white and the detailed story of his friend Kina Scott surviving an attack in the Chatham Islands.
Key points
What was said, by whom, with the exact words. Timestamps jump to the moment.
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande says he never intended to become a filmmaker and that his career resulted from a childhood fascination with sharks.
“I mean, it all actually happened completely by accident. I never planned to become a filmmaker at all. It was a childhood fascination with sharks”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande argues Shark Week was long perceived as sensationalizing sharks for ratings, but its volume of programming was unmatched for a wildlife filmmaker.
“Shark Week was always kind of seen as like, Jaws and claws, hyping things up for ratings, scaring the hell out of people, blood and guts so that people would watch”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande believes Mick Fanning's leash likely prevented the shark from biting him at Jeffreys Bay.
“I mean it was probably his leash that potentially prevented him from actually getting bit”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande says he feels less nervous underwater with visible sharks than floating at the surface where he cannot see them.
“I feel way more comfortable under the water with sharks and obviously being able to see them than ever floating at the surface”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande says sharks that are chummed or fed become habituated to boats and people.
“Anywhere where you get sharks that are being fed, whether it's chummed for fishing, chummed for diving, they do. They become habituated”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande recounts privately warning Michael Phelps that the beach Discovery chose for his swim was the site of two fatal consumptive great white attacks.
“I got to tell you, where they want you to swim is the last place you want to swim”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande proposes using AI and environmental variables to predict the probability of negative shark encounters at particular beaches.
“if we could learn, like, what makes a place more dangerous than another place, even use AI to predict, like, shark attack – what's the word? Predict like negative shark encounter probability”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande reports detecting two great whites tagged a thousand miles and two years apart arriving at the same offshore Naples tower on the same night within an hour of each other.
“both of these great white sharks showed up at the exact same day on the exact same night within an hour of each other at 10 o'clock at night on this offshore like rig system, this Navy tower”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande says GoPro staff wanted the footage of a tiger shark closing its jaws around his wife's head deleted for fear of losing future freedom.
“they said, we have to delete this. If our bosses, if Nick Woodman, if anyone ever sees this footage, they'll never let us do anything fun ever again”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande says he prefers baiting sharks for photography to killing them, and that live sharks are more economically valuable than dead ones.
“I would much rather people bait sharks and take their picture than bait sharks and chop their heads off and sell their fins”
- Danny Jones
Jones argues that neither the Jaws-era demonization of sharks nor the opposite portrayal of them as gentle is accurate.
“These things are killers. These things are predatory killing machines”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande says sharks' fearsome reputation vastly exceeds their actual lethality, killing fewer than ten people a year.
“it's like they have the best marketing team on the planet they kill less than single digits every year yet they're the biggest baddest motherfuckers monsters ever to have lived”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande argues sharks matter because they balance ocean ecosystems that supply most of the oxygen humans breathe.
“Sharks, they're balancing the oceans, right? And without the oceans being healthy, we have less air to breathe”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande recounts that an Austrian diver at Tiger Beach was fatally attacked after a current shift forced a long swim back to the boat with baited tigers in tow.
“one of these tigers... grabbed the girl by the arm... and... it started... trying to ragdoll her”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande argues tiger sharks hunt with deliberate unpredictability so prey such as turtles cannot habituate to their schedule.
“So instead of showing up at the same time and being predictable, tigers are using this pattern of complete unpredictability”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande says orcas are culturally specialized, with New Zealand populations eating sharks and rays while Californian ones hunt seals and whales.
“she taught me that orcas are very cultural and that the ones in New Zealand, they focus on eating sharks and stingrays, but they won't eat seals”
- Danny Jones
Jones predicts future generations will view keeping orcas in captivity the way we now view slavery.
“A couple of decades from now, people are going to look back at that. Like same way we look back at like slavery”
- Danny Jones
Jones says Gulf fishing quotas became tradable, allowing Wall Street investors to buy and lease them back to fishermen at higher prices.
“So like dudes on wall street were buying fishing quota and then leasing it out to people in the fishing community for even bigger prices”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande says fishermen angered by his criticism of shark tournaments have threatened to kill his family.
“I've had multiple fishermen say, hey, I know where you live”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande contends NOAA's long-running sandbar shark research quota functions as a federally subsidized shark fin trade.
“I strongly believe it's like... subsidized federal shark fin trade”
Linked moment · 2:18:10Skip to 2:18:10 using a listen link in the info box.
Andy CasagrandeCasagrande says the greatest danger in his work is human error and panic rather than the animals themselves.
“it's just like stupid human error that gets people killed”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande criticizes Stanford-affiliated great white PhD researchers who had never observed the species underwater and argues credentials are not required for meaningful contribution.
“you are a PhD great white shark expert and you've never seen the animal that you're a PhD in underwater, like in its own environment”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande says no one has documented great whites mating and that fin-mounted remote cameras are the likeliest way to capture it.
“no one has ever documented great whites getting it on”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande describes a theory that orcas locate great whites by hearing their acoustic research tags, meaning tagging may aid predation.
“there is now a theory that orcas are potentially targeting sharks that are tagged because they can track them down easier”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande says humans are clearly not on sharks' menu because otherwise attacks would be a daily occurrence.
“clearly we're not on the menu because if we were and sharks realized that humans were a viable prey item, there would be attacks every single day”
- Andy Casagrande
Casagrande says Shark Week is declining and that YouTube is the future of wildlife media.
“even now, like Shark Week starting to like kind of die down. So I think YouTube is the future, bro”
People
In the conversation
- Danny JonesAmerican podcaster and host of the Danny Jones Podcast
- Andy CasagrandeAmerican two-time Emmy-winning wildlife cinematographer and shark diver known for Discovery Channel's Shark Week
Discussed
- Mick FanningAustralian professional surfer who survived a great white encounter at Jeffreys Bay
- Mark HealeyAmerican big wave surfer and spearfisherman who freedives with sharks
- Michael PhelpsAmerican Olympic swimmer who appeared in a Shark Week special
- Ocean RamseyHawaii-based shark diver and conservationist
- Steve IrwinAustralian wildlife presenter killed by a stingray in 2006
- Ingrid VisserNew Zealand marine biologist specializing in orcas
- Paul NicklenNational Geographic photographer known for polar bear imagery
- Jane GoodallBritish primatologist who began studying chimpanzees without formal academic training
- MrBeastAmerican YouTuber, born Jimmy Donaldson, who filmed a shark stunt off Jupiter, Florida
- Pete ZuccariniUnderwater cinematographer who worked on Dolphin Tale, Pirates of the Caribbean and Avatar
- Mark RackleyCameraman who filmed and helped rescue a diver during a Nile crocodile attack
- John LillyAmerican neuroscientist who conducted dolphin communication experiments and invented the sensory deprivation tank
- Rick O'BarryDolphin activist featured in The Cove
- Paul WatsonMarine conservation activist and anti-poaching campaigner
- Kina ScottNew Zealand diver and underwater camera operator who survived a great white shark attack
- Chris FallowsSouth African photographer known for images of breaching great white sharks
- Nick WoodmanFounder and CEO of GoPro
- Carlos GaunaDrone operator who films sharks off the California coast
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From the publisher
Watch every episode ad-free & uncensored on Patreon: https://patreon.com/dannyjones Andy Casagrande is a two-time Emmy winning wildlife cinematographer, producer, on-camera presenter, and shark diver best known for his long-running work on Discovery Channel’s Shark Week. He has filmed and produced hundreds of wildlife projects for National Geographic, Discovery, BBC, and Animal Planet. @abc4explore SPONSORS http://kalshi.com/r/dannyjones - Download the Kalshi app and use code DANNYJONES to get $20 when you trade $20. https://butcherbox.com/danny - Get $20 off your first box, plus your choice of free ribeye, new york strip, or filet mignon in every box for a year. https://whiterabbitenergy.com/?ref=DJP - Use code DJP for 20% off. EPISODE LINKS Andy's Channel: @abc4explore *NEW* DJP MERCH https://dannyjonespodcast.com Get paid to make clips from the show: https://discord.com/invite/dannyjones FOLLOW DANNY JONES https://www.instagram.com/dannyjones https://twitter.com/jonesdanny OUTLINE 00:00 - Andy Casagrande's path to shark filmmaking 02:41 - Childhood, schizophrenia, and studying psychology 09:37 - National Geographic vs. Shark Week 12:07 - Filming Mick Fanning after his shark encounter 17:58 - Shark encounters while surfing 21:16 - Mark Healey freediving with great white sharks 23:28 - Do sharks get used to humans? 26:52 - Drone footage of sharks near swimmers 33:50 - Michael Phelps' Shark Week swim 37:17 - Why some beaches have more shark attacks 43:10 - Tracking great whites off Naples 53:09 - The tiger shark that nearly killed Andy's wife 59:03 - Tiger sharks vs. great whites 01:02:20 - Putting cameras on sharks 01:04:38 - Jaws, Ocean Ramsey & shark stereotypes 01:09:30 - Why whale sharks have teeth on their eyes 01:12:30 - The fatal Tiger Beach dive 01:18:08 - The Cove & learning to freedive 01:21:41 - Danny ran out of air underwater 01:26:19 - Why don't wild orcas attack humans? 01:32:06 - Blackfish & keeping orcas in captivity 01:33:58 - Working on Dolphin T…
Summary, chapters and key points were generated from the episode transcript on September 27, 2026. Quotes are checked word for word against the transcript.