Jessica Blacklow had been trying to get the same photo for years and always failed.
The photographer, based in Newcastle, New South Wales, was visiting Sydney when she saw a wave forming in front of Manly Beach. She recognized the movement in the water: dolphins about to surf it. They usually jump so quickly that they escape her frame. Not that afternoon. An entire pod took the same wave, aligned, synchronized, as if they had choreographed it. “I had never seen so many dolphins surfing together like that”, she told Newsweek. “It must have been my lucky day”.
She uploaded the photos to her Facebook page, Wiltliving, with the title “manly lineup”, and they went viral within hours. The curious thing is that even science has no clear answer: David Lusseau, professor of marine sustainability at the Technical University of Denmark, explains that this behavior has barely been studied. What is known is that dolphins play constantly, pass algae among themselves, compete to reach the surface, and treat play as part of their daily routine.
The scene lasted seconds before the pod disappeared. But it was enough to show that sometimes animals do something astonishing simply because they look like they’re having fun.