Australian beach evacuated after huge Great White Shark spotted off the coast

A beach had to be evacuated after the shark was spotted

People had to be evacuated off a local beach after the 7-metre shark was spotted (Shark Alerts South Australia /Facebook)

Beachgoers evacuated a beach after a great white shark thought to be up to 7 metres long was spotted off the coast of Adelaide.

A helicopter on patrol spotted the shark 100 metres offshore at the Marino Rocks on Sunday afternoon.

The huge fish, estimated to be about 22 feet in length, was compared to the shark that terrorises people in Steven Spielberg’s 1975 film.

The local newspaper The Advertiser reports the helicopter successfully herded the shark out to sea to distance it from people, where it disappeared into deeper water.

An unnamed crew member who posted a photograph of the shark on the Facebook page of Shark Alerts South Australia said: “It’s the biggest I’ve ever seen as a crew member in the Westpac chopper.

"It's the biggest Iv ever seen as a crew member in the Westpac chopper, we put it down as 7m the photo really doesn't do...

Posted by Shark Alerts South Australia on Sunday, January 17, 2016

“We put it down as 7m - the photo really doesn’t do it justice.”

Shark Alerts South Australia, which monitors shark movements, said the crew used their six-metre jet boat to estimate the size of the great white and found the animal to be bigger.

The sheer size of the shark was enough to make officials on the beach sound a siren, cancelling all nearby “nipper events” and pulling all swimmers out of the water.