Sunscreen, insect repellent and the Sharktivity app are must-have beach accessories along the US east coast this summer as human shark encounters increase.
Ironically, conservation gains for endangered species could be behind the unfortunate surge, experts say, while there could also be a climate link if apex predator prey moves to new waters.
Great whites migrate up the Atlantic coast of the United States toward New England each summer, peaking in numbers between August and October.
“There is an overall increase in population that we believe is recovering after being protected,” Gregory Skomal, a senior fisheries scientist for the state of Massachusetts, told AFP.
About 300 of the animals, the world’s largest known fish, have been tagged over the years, and about a hundred migrate through the waters around Cape Cod each year.
The iconic film “Jaws” was filmed in this region, and the creatures are a major tourist attraction, adorning baseball caps and T-shirts. On the flip side, however, there have already been temporary beach closures this year following confirmed sightings near shore.
A big part of the reason is that their main prey, seals, are also recovering thanks to increased protection measures.
“As more sharks feed near land and more people swim, the likelihood of these types of adverse interactions increases,” Skomal said.
Enter the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy Sharktivity app, developed with input from Massachusetts wildlife officials, to provide shark sighting information from researchers, safety officials, and user reports.
– surveillance patrols –
In the state of New York, the governor has just announced additional surveillance patrols, including with drones and helicopters.
Half a dozen shark bites have been found on Long Island’s tourist beaches, and none in three years.
Great white sharks are less likely to be the culprits here than other shark species operating in the region, particularly tiger sharks, sand tiger sharks and bull sharks.
Nick Whitney, a senior scientist at the New England Aquarium, thinks the increasing encounters here may be related to the sharks’ baitfish — menhaden, also known as porgies or bunkers — recovering.
This could be due to cleaner waters off New York and New Jersey, “but it’s difficult to figure out how much of that is population increase or just population movement as a result of changing ocean conditions from climate change.”
But while things can vary wildly from year to year at the local level, the global level remains constant, with about 75 shark attacks recorded each year, said Gavin Naylor, director of a research program on sharks at the University of Florida.
This follows a brief drop to around 60 in the first two years of the Covid-19 pandemic.
There are about five deaths worldwide every year. In the past twenty years, only two deaths have been reported north of Delaware in the United States, in Cape Cod in 2018 and Maine in 2020.
But in the future it can be assumed that the number of victims will increase.
“We will get more dead. There are more great white sharks, the probability will increase,” predicts Naylor, even if the trend is not yet statistically significant.
Surfers venturing further out into the water accounted for half of unprovoked attacks in 2021. Further south, Florida, with its many tourist beaches and tropical climate, still hosts 60 percent of US and 40 percent of global attacks.
– take precautions –
Sharks are a far cry from the bloodthirsty beasts sometimes portrayed in movies.
Studies have shown that they can mistake surfers or swimmers for their usual prey — particularly great white sharks, which have pretty poor eyesight.
“With so many people in the water on a global scale, if sharks preferred to feed on humans, we would have tens of thousands of attacks every year,” Skomal said.
With climate change, the expert expects rising sea temperatures to gradually lengthen the season when sharks are present in the northern United States.
So what can be done to limit the risks? People should download the Sharktivity app to track sightings.
“Another thing we’re telling people is to be aware of their surroundings,” Whitney said. For example, look out for birds flying around schools of baitfish.
Don’t swim alone, stick to areas with cell phone signal and if bitten the real danger is bleeding, so it’s important to go ashore and control the bleeding until help arrives.
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