Divers off Almuñecar have captured images of a blue shark, known locally as a tintorera, swimming near the surface in daylight. Footage from last Sunday comes from Open Water La Herradura, a dive firm that runs authorised marine wildlife trips on Granada’s Costa Tropical.

Big pelagic animals are turning up more often in these waters. This latest clip, shown on national TV station Telecinco, shows a sleek open-ocean hunter in conditions that usually keep it out of sight.

What the footage shows

Open Water La Herradura diving school recorded the animal in open water, not in a packed bathing zone. Staff say the outing was under a permit from Spain’s Ministry for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge (MITECO), with professionals in charge and the usual rules applied.

Blue sharks already use the Granada coast. Crews from the same company say climate change is also bringing in other species that were once far harder to find here. Similar wildlife trips from the firm have previously put fin whales on camera off La Herradura and Torrox.

Why a daytime surface swim is unusual

Aula del Mar at the University of Granada describes the blue shark as an open-water species that can reach four metres. It has a slim body, a long pointed snout, large eyes and serrated triangular teeth in the upper jaw.

These sharks roam thousands of kilometres. Night work at 60 to 300 metres is their usual pattern, which is why a shallow daytime pass off Almuñecar caught people’s attention. Fish and molluscs make up most of the diet, so attacks on marine mammals or seabirds are not the norm.

Mediterranean blue sharks are in a worse state than the global stock. IUCN lists the species as Near Threatened worldwide and Critically Endangered in the Mediterranean, mainly because of fishing.

No reason to panic on the sand

Open Water La Herradura is clear that a tintorera in the Med does not equal danger for holidaymakers. It is part of the local sea, and this species needs protection more than it needs panic.

If one appears, stay calm, keep a sensible gap and do not touch, chase or try to “help” it. Anyone already in the water should move away slowly and leave the sea if that feels safer.

Costa Tropical has seen other large sharks this year. A shortfin mako was reported several miles off Almuñecar in April, well away from swimming areas. A wider look at where sharks turn up around Spain puts this sighting in context rather than treating it as a freak event.

A single aircraft aborting its take-off shouldn’t be able to stop an entire airport, yet that’s what happened at Gatwick on Friday, grounding flights to Spain along with everything else.

The drama unfolded shortly after 2pm on Friday September 4, when Norse Atlantic Airways flight Z0701, a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner bound for New York’s JFK airport, rejected its take-off roll on runway 26L at around 120 knots.

Because that runway is the only one Gatwick has, the airport declared an immediate ground stop the moment the jet came to a halt, holding every departure, including flights to Spain, until the aircraft could be cleared.

Nose gear fault forced the jet to abort at high speed 

Flight-tracking specialists reported that the Boeing’s nose gear developed a fault as the aircraft accelerated down the runway, forcing the pilots to reject the take-off before reaching flying speed. Rejecting a take-off at 120 knots, close to the point where many wide-body jets commit to leaving the ground, is a manoeuvre crews train for regularly, and no injuries were reported among the passengers or crew on board. Emergency vehicles were sent to the runway as a precaution while the aircraft sat disabled on the tarmac. 

Passengers told to travel as normal as easyJet flights were diverted

A Gatwick spokesperson said at the time: “Due to a technical issue with a departing aircraft, our runway is currently closed. Our teams are working to move the aircraft and resume operations as quickly as possible.” Passengers already booked to fly were told to head to the airport as normal and check directly with their airline for updates.

EasyJet operates more routes out of Gatwick than any other airline, including dozens of daily connections to Spain, and several of its flights were diverted to London Luton and London Stansted while the runway stayed shut. The diversions set off knock-on delays at both airports for the rest of the day. 

Runway reopened after 50 minutes and a full safety check

The stricken Boeing was towed off runway 26L and onto a remote stand at around 2.30pm, and normal flight operations resumed six minutes later. In total, the closure lasted 50 minutes.

“The aircraft was towed from the runway, which reopened shortly afterwards following a full safety inspection,” a Gatwick spokesperson confirmed, adding that safety and security was the airport’s “number one priority”. Passengers whose flights were delayed or diverted were still working through the disruption into the evening.

How a single aircraft can freeze the world’s busiest one-runway airport

Gatwick has long billed itself as the busiest single-runway airport in the world, handling more than 40 million passengers a year through one strip of tarmac. Its second runway is kept as a back-up, used only when the main one is unavailable, which means a stranded aircraft has nowhere else for traffic to go, unlike Heathrow or Manchester.

Friday’s closure was resolved quickly and without injury, though leaving a knock on effect throughout the day in the form of delays for many flights coming in and going out of the airport. 

One of the questions I hear regularly in clinic is, “How do I know if I actually need a hearing test?”

It’s a good question. And the answer is often rather more subtle than people expect.

Hearing loss rarely happens overnight. It usually develops so gradually that we adapt to it without really noticing. A little more television volume here. Asking someone to repeat themselves there. Perhaps avoiding the noisy restaurant because conversation has somehow become exhausting.

And because these changes happen slowly, we often blame everything except our hearing.

People are mumbling.

The television programmes aren’t recorded properly anymore.

Restaurants have become ridiculously noisy.

Sound familiar?

One of the first things many people notice is that they can hear someone talking but can’t quite understand what they’re saying. This is particularly noticeable in busy places where background noise competes with speech.

That’s because hearing isn’t simply about volume. It’s about clarity.

As hearing changes, some of the finer speech sounds become harder to hear. You may still hear a person’s voice perfectly well, but miss the small sounds that allow your brain to work out exactly what they’ve said.

Another clue is tiredness.

Listening to a conversation shouldn’t feel like hard work. But when your hearing isn’t giving your brain all the information it needs, your brain has to work harder to fill in the gaps. By the end of a family meal or an evening with friends, you may feel surprisingly exhausted.

Perhaps the most telling sign, however, is when somebody else notices.

A partner might say, “You didn’t hear me.”

A family member might complain that the television is too loud.

A friend may suggest that you have your hearing checked.

They may actually have noticed something you haven’t.

From the clinic

I often tell patients that a hearing test isn’t about proving that something is wrong. Sometimes it simply provides reassurance that everything is fine.

And if there is a hearing loss, knowing exactly what is happening is much better than guessing.

A hearing assessment is straightforward, painless and informative. It gives you an opportunity to understand your hearing properly and decide what, if anything, you want to do about it. There is no prize for waiting until your hearing becomes a serious problem.

If you’ve noticed that conversations are becoming harder, you’re asking people to repeat themselves more often, or you’re simply thinking, “My hearing isn’t quite as good as it used to be,” that’s reason enough to have it checked.

Sometimes the best outcome of a hearing test is reassurance.

And sometimes, understanding what you’ve been missing is the first step towards hearing life more clearly again.

Contact Protea Wellness Audiology

Call: 698 418 642

www.proteawellnessaudiology.es

contact@proteawellnessaudiology.es

Address: Quesada Business Centre, Calle Los Arcos 17, Ciudad Quesada, 03170