Michael Packard, 56, was on his second dive of the day looking for lobsters in Cape Code, a peninsula in the US state of Massachusetts, on the southeast coast. His vessel “Ja’n J” was sitting just off popular Herring Cove Beach – alongside a fleet of other boats fishing for striped bass.
The method behind commercial lobster diving is collecting lobsters from the sandy bottom while diving.
And, 45ft (14 metres) deep, this is where the father-of-two had his terrifying encounter with the humpback whale.
He told Cape Cod Times: “All of a sudden, I felt this huge shove and the next thing I knew it was completely black.
“I could sense I was moving, and I could feel the whale squeezing with the muscles in his mouth.”
At first, Mr Packard thought he had been swallowed by a great white shark.
But he could not feel any teeth and did notice any serious injuries.
It was then that he realised he was inside a whale.
He added: “I was completely inside; it was completely black. I thought to myself, ‘there’s no way I’m getting out of here. I’m done, I’m dead.’
“All I could think of was my boys — they’re 12 and 15 years old.”
