Professional surfers Bruce Irons and Sam McIntosh came up with a simple trick that makes surfers, who are usually already fun to watch, look like flaming wrathful ancient Japanese or Hindu gods.
When McIntosh suggested that Irons strap flares to his surf board, Irons was skeptical. However, the stunt was successful – the flares on Irons’ board reflect off of the water around him, silhouette his form and light the wave up from the inside when he rides within its tube, making for an other-worldly sight. The video was uploaded back in 2011, but has found renewed interest after Reddit users began circulating parts of the video that had been converted into animated .gif images.
The stunt certainly looks cool, but some commenters pointed out this could be potentially dangerous – many sharks hunt at night, and the flares could attract their attention. Flare surfers might look like surfing birthday cakes to them.
