What sea monster created a whirlpool that swallowed ships?

Charybdis was the sea monster that created a whirlpool capable of swallowing ships.

In Homer’s Odyssey, Charybdis lived beneath a rock in a narrow channel opposite Scylla. Three times each day, she swallowed enormous quantities of seawater and then spewed it back out, producing a violent whirlpool. Sailors who came too close risked losing their entire vessel.

Odysseus deliberately steered nearer to Scylla because Charybdis threatened to destroy the whole ship. Scylla seized and ate six of his crewmen, but the vessel escaped. Later, after Odysseus was shipwrecked, Charybdis swallowed his raft; he survived by clinging to a fig tree above the whirlpool.

The myth traditionally places Charybdis in the Strait of Messina, between Sicily and mainland Italy. Scylla and Charybdis are the source of the phrase “between Scylla and Charybdis,” meaning a choice between two dangerous alternatives. Scylla was the multi-headed monster; Charybdis was the whirlpool hazard.