Shark Airport

Shark Airport is a named dive in Apo Reef Natural Park, off Occidental Mindoro. Pandan Island Dive Resort lists it with Menor Island, while archived Marco Vincent and Manta operator pages also name Shark Airport in their Apo Reef diving information.

The mapped Shark Airport dive point and a historical park-mooring waypoint differ by about 317 m. The map point is approximate, not a surveyed entry or navigation waypoint. Its relationship to Binangaan Drop-off is unconfirmed; this guide does not merge those names. This is Apo Reef Natural Park, not the Shark Airport dive in Tubbataha.

The guide uses the named OpenStreetMap point attributed to Schadow1 Expeditions. A separate cruiser report records a park-mooring position under the same name; it may describe a different reference point rather than the dive itself. Neither position establishes current mooring availability.

This partial guide leaves depth, visibility, current strength and entry arrangements unknown. Confirm the intended site and present conditions with a local operator. Reports of resting sharks are historical source observations, not a promise of encounters.

Where the name points

Pandan Island Dive Resort's current page lists the site as Menor Island (Shark Airport), a dive on the west side of Menor Island at 15 to 35 m known for resting sharks on a plateau at around 35 m, and notes the corals are less colourful than around Apo Island. Schadow1 Expeditions' mapping report of 15 February 2014 also places the Shark Airport and Manta dive sites west of Apo Menor Island, calls them an 18 to 25 m dive where whitetip sharks and manta rays were abundant, and records the Shark site at N12.66814 E120.43264. The DENR Protected Area Office list in the 2014 MBCFI Ecotourism Plan has no row named Shark Airport; its Manta Point entry at 120°25'56.5" E, 12°40'16.8" N matches the Manta position in the Schadow1 report, so the park list and the operator name are not joined here.

Dated descriptions of the dive

A Marco Vincent Divers page archived on 28 October 2016 gives 25 ft to over 250 ft and describes a wall in two parts, the first ending in a large sand step between 60 and 90 ft where the whitetips rest, with 10 to 15 sharks expected on a good day, a second wall dropping away below, eagle rays in the deep, schools of bluestripe snapper on the reef edge and mating pairs of cuttlefish in the early months of the year. Gustav's Place's current page repeats that description with a 3 to 30 m range and a dozen sharks, and Diver Bliss and Mabuhay Travel reprint the Marco Vincent text, so those pages form one lineage. California Diver Magazine's article of 23 July 2015 called Shark Airport a stretch of reef with white sand where whitetip reef sharks rest from the currents, sometimes so many that they look like airplanes waiting to take off. Diver Bliss's author dived Shark Airport in February 2019 and wrote that most dives went beyond 30 m looking for mantas, rays and sharks. Divernet's feature of 10 March 2021, without using the name, reported sleeping whitetip sharks and a huge Napoleon wrasse on Menor Island's shallow white sandy bottom.

Open points

The resting plateau is given at around 35 m by Pandan, at 60 to 90 ft by Marco Vincent and at 18 to 25 m by Schadow1; these are not reconciled here. Shark counts are dated observations, not expectations.