Katharine The Great White Shark Makes Florida Return

Katharine, the great white shark with more than 43,000 Twitter followers, has made a return to Florida’s warmer waters. The famous fish pinged in near West Palm Beach over the weekend.

She was last located in the Jupiter area, Ami Meite, spokeswoman for Ocearch, told Patch on Thursday. Katharine is one of the more famous sharks tracked by Ocearch, a nonprofit organization dedicated to researching great white sharks and apex predators.

Katharine had more or less followed a migratory pattern over the past few years that took her from Massachusetts south to Florida’s coastline and back again. A few summers ago, she became the first of Ocearch’s tagged great whites to venture into the Gulf of Mexico, Meite said. She was quickly joined by Besty, who made an appearance in waters off St. Petersburg back in April 2015.

Before surfacing off West Palm over the weekend, Katharine’s satellite tracker hadn’t pinged for a while. Her reemergence was clearly welcomed by her Twitter followers.

“Welcome back, big girl,” a fan named Lisa tweeted. “So glad you checked in. We worry, y’know.”

See also: Katharine the Great White Shark Returns to Florida

Katharine’s previous journey into the Gulf was a rarity, but great white sightings off Florida’s west coast aren’t necessarily unheard of. Katharine and Betsy might be among the most famous great whites to venture into the Gulf, but they are certainly not the only ones of their kind to do so. Back in January 2015, a charter boat captain in the Panama City Beach area reported a run in between his trolling motor and a great white.

“He had the entire trolling motor in his mouth, and was moving it side to side, and it was shaking the boat,” Capt. Scott Fitzgerald told MyPanhandle.com following the encounter. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission confirmed the attack involved a great white, MyPanhandle noted.

See also: Great White Shark Attacks Fishing Boat

Great whites are normally found in “cool, coastal waters throughout the world,” National Geographic pointed out on its website. The creatures are considered the largest predatory fish on the planet and can grow to an average of 15 feet in length.

At last report, Katharine measured in at more than 14 feet. Ocearch has been keeping up with her travels since she was tagged off Cape Cod in 2013.

Shark lovers can generally track Katharine, Betsy and other Ocearch sharks via the organization’s website. The site, however, was down as of Thursday afternoon. Katharine’s Twitter account remained very much active though.

“Just doing shark things,” one of Katharine’s last tweets read.

Whether Katharine will make her way into the Gulf is a question only she knows the answer to. Her journey can be followed on the Ocearch website (when the current technical kinks are worked out).

See also: Shark Researchers Cast Net in Gulf Waters

Ocearch, Tampa Bay area residents may remember, is also the organization that’s been doing some pretty cool research on sharks more commonly found in the Gulf. The organization conducted an expedition in 2015 that was designed to enhance understanding of how apex predators in the Gulf’s water migrate.

That expedition, underwritten by Caterpillar, was “the first large shark expedition like this on the western Gulf,” Chris Fischer, Ocearch founding chairman and expedition leader, told Patch. Researchers, including those from Sarasota’s Mote Marine Laboratory and Aquarium, focused on such species as mako, tiger and hammerhead sharks.

To keep up with all Ocearch’s activities, follow it on Twitter.

Photo of Katharine courtesy of Ocearch