Shark Week Exclusive: Watch a Shark Do an Unbelievable 360 Turn Above the Water in ‘Air Jaws: Top Guns’ (Video)

thewrap.com:

Discovery Channel’s Shark Week returns Sunday night for its 34th year and TheWrap has an exclusive sneak peek at an incredible moment from one of its most jaw-dropping programs — “Air Jaws: Top Guns.”In the clip above, filmed in South Africa earlier this year, the “Air Jaws” team managed to lure a shark with their fake seal decoy that trailed behind the boat, catching on film a legendary great white shark as it propelled itself out of the water, and performed a 360-degree turn in the air, before diving back down with very little splash. (Taking notes, Maverick?)The objective for this year’s “Air Jaws” installment, from creator Jeff Kurr (also an executive producer, director, underwater cinematographer, editor, writer and on-camera shark expert for Shark Week) — the 22nd for the franchise — was to shoot the largest breaching great white shark ever captured on film“I had the pleasure of, up until this year, filming the largest great white, which is this 15-foot humongous beast of a shark that came flying out of the water. … But we wanted to see if we could top it because all the cameras are newer — higher resolution.

The original ‘Air Jaws’ we actually shot in standard definition — videotapes, believe it or not. So now we’re up to 6k, we’re up to 8k and so these breaching sharks are just amazing,” Kurr told TheWrap.

When the Shark Week team travelled to South Africa to film the creatures of the deep, they had the latest hi-def cameras, but changes in nature in recent years put up new roadblocks in achieving their goals.“There’s more to the story, because in South Africa, you’ve probably heard that great whites are in a little bit of a pickle because they’re being attacked and killed by orcas.