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Accidents and IncidentsThis forum is for the discussion of diving Accidents and Incidents. Please read the message at the top of the forum before posting threads or responses. Memorial threads can be posted in the Passings forum.
Please note: The last reply in this thread was more than 7 month(s) ago.
The theory of changed behaviour (not proven anywhere) would presume any boat anchoring near a shark dive location would immediately have sharks swarming all over ready to bite divers. Doesn't happen, never will.
As I noted in a previous post, the theory of changed behavior, or habituation, has been demonstrated. Here is a review of the current state of research. Peter Klimley (1994) got as far as suggesting that berleying appears to cause whites to stay longer in areas they would not normally visit.
Research specific to habituation of sharks to divers (diver not food source -> food + diver -> diver is food source) is inconclusive.
Most efforts read like this gem from the shark foundation:
Quote:
The Foundation supported a project initiated by Dr. E. Ritter up until the third quarter of 2001 with a total of CHF 94,000. Up until this time no concrete results in the two projects on shark conditioning and shark migrations could be presented, despite various requests. Except for a publication which did not directly relate to the projects, no additional scientific work was published in this area.
The Board of Trustees thus decided to stop supporting the two projects due to lack of results. Ritter was asked to return the underwater camera and the Foundation's VEMCO tracking material so that they could be used in other projects.
Total investments: approx. CHF 94,000
A very important series of studies was supposed to be conducted by the University of Stellenbosch (South Africa) but I can't find any results.
These studies were prompted by concerns in South Africa that the thriving shark tourism industry's use of baiting during shark dives was associating divers/snorkelers with food. The Shark Concern Group lead by Craig Bovim (shark attack survivor) argues that these dives are causing sharks to visit divers/snorkelers/surfers in the hopes of obtaining food...thus increasing the amount of interaction between man and shark. The theory goes that even if sharks don't think the person is food, the increased amount of interaction allows for more "accidental "tastings" to occur. The industry responds with the argument that habituation of sharks to divers has not been demonstrated. This claim is fair, but I think they should go the extra mile in saying, "We don't know."
Quote:
Originally Posted by dhaas
Your choice is of course your choice. Just don't try and limit mine.
I would rephrase this: Your choice is of course your choice, unless it limits mine.
Coastguard spokeswoman Petty Officer Jennifer Johnson said: "We strongly advise tourists not to take one of these trips. This particularly applies to people from Britain and Europe who may not be fully aware of the potential dangers."
This is a somewhat complicated question. On one hand anyone who gets into the water for the express purpose of watching sharks eat has to at least consider what's potentially on the dinner plate.
On the other hand we live is such a world of fake adventure where all sorts of things are staged for the safe and sane amusement of tourists that it is becoming increasingly difficult to find the dividing line between actual risky undertakings and staged photo opportunities that are advertised as safe (a word that means "without risk") and are designed to result in photographic proof that Bill and Maude from North Lamadoo (a small midwestern town), can, after their on line course, one day of pool instruction and referral dive in the Bahamas, zip into a phone booth, pull on some neoprene and emerge as, "the Derring Do Divers," just like the the folks on the TV. Okay, that's a little exaggerated to make the point, but not by much.
Non-cage dives exist in the blurred middle ground, they are (based on past experience) fairly low risk, at least in terms of the odds of being badly bitten. But sharks are unpredictable and permitting oneself to be lulled into complacency by past experience is a recipe for this sort of rare event.
Chances are I am one of only a very few divers on the board here that has had a (shall we call it "high intensity?") interaction with a wild, non-baited Bull Shark. Permit me to say that bull sharks are unpredictable and that there was no reason for what occurred, other than my (or the shark, depending on your perspective) being in the wrong place at the wrong time. This unpredictability coupled with many many encounters will inevitably result in some tragedies.
I feel that it is important that people be able to see sharks in the wild. I think it is important that people be able to decide what risks they want to take. And I think it is critical that people actually understand the risks that they are paying others to expose them to.
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How many of us here would be afraid to do a shark dive? My guess is very few because we know that we have a very low probability of being injured or and an astronomically low probability of being killed by sharks even in a situation in which chum, blood, or other attractants are present in the water. One of the reasons that we know this is because people have been working with these animals for many years doing shark dives, shark feeds, shark observation, etc. The commercial operations that bring divers into close encounters with sharks are often the same operations that bring the world's scientists and filmmakers into the same encounters. The diving professionals who work with these animals on a daily basis continually learn aspects of shark behavior we would never know if not for the ability to encounter them day after day week after week and month after month. Scientists are often clued into studying shark behavior in a systematic way by the dive guides who begin to notice various behavioral patterns and filmmakers record the behavior to be viewed by both scientists and the general public. All of this increases our awareness of what sharks are capable of learning through interactions with humans. We've come a long way since Jaws and regarding these creatures as mindless eating machines. Thanks to commercial shark diving operations the revenue from sport divers to experience seeing and interacting with sharks allows dive industry professionals the time in the water to learn and observe and inform icthyologists and marine biologists about information that would otherwise be lost. It's also easier for scientists to find and study these animals because there are locations where sharks frequent thanks to shark feeding and shark diving. It's possible to observe sharks with learned behavior interacting with humans as well as finding the same species in remote areas and comparing behaviors. With so much ocean in the world, it would be a great loss to shut down such activities when the overall impact on the world's shark population is not even really affected by the few places in which behavior may be modified. Becoming ignorant of new knowledge, facts and understanding would be far more tragic than the very rare times when a person will be injured or killed in the history of the activity.
Since EPCOT was mentioned, I did The Living Seas dive thanks to NAUI at DEMA. NAUI provided my boss at Lehigh Valley Dive Center with tickets for the experience. While in the tank, I was mostly stressed out by having to dive in split fins. We had several shark species swimming with us, but guess what animal divers have to be protected from in the experience - dolphins! If you ask those instructors and industry pros who work with both sharks and dolphins, the dolphins are more problematic and cause more injury when interacting with humans. I've also done shark dives with the guides in chainmail with a large group and in a private charter in which professional filming was done. There is a lot more to doing shark feeds than the average customer realizes. The pros also know a lot more about shark behavior in general and about shark behavior on a given day than people know. There are times when the sharks really do not want to take the food and other times when the feeder is getting constantly bumped while trying to feed. Many of the bites that happen to the dive pros may be considered deserved because they do something that they know they shouldn't do such as a non-chainmailed safety diver handling bait prior to the dive. The scent might be on the diver and a shark may explore the possibility that a hand or arm is a fish. Minor injuries are part of thye job for the dive pros just as dog bites are part of being in veternary medicine or pet grooming.
If the shark bite wasn't the cause of death in this case and DCI/AGE was to blame due to a rapid ascent, it also doesn't sit well to crucify someone for being fatally injured while trying to escape such a situation. Looking back on every accident I've ever had around the house or in a car, hindsight is always 20/20. Accidents happen underwater and due to the nature of water, pressure and the fact that we can't breathe it will exacerbate any emergency situation. A frightened person trying to flee from a grizzly isn't met with the pressure changes that a diver fleeing a shark bite must face.
Monday morning quarterbacking, speculation, accident analysis, etc., won't change the fact that an accident such as this is extremely unlikely, and even if another happened tomorrow, 20 years could pass before another happened again. Unfortunately, grieving families, naysayers, people with professional jealousies, journalists, opportunists, and others with political agendas may want to see an end to the activity of shark diving where the pros may far outweigh the cons and what people have gained in their personal lives by seeing these amazing creatures may far outweigh the losses. A couple years ago, I lost a skeg, the FCS box and had punch-like hole in my board while surfing that cost a couple hundred dollars to repair. I felt something strike hard at the bottom of my board. We never saw what did it. It could have been a shark or some other creature. But, had I been bitten or killed I would hate to think that others would be deprived of surfing or having the chance to dive with sharks as I have because of the enrichment given to my life as a result. When I enter the water, whether to cave dive, to surf, or with sharks I know that a very slight risk exists and I give the environment the same respect I give power tools, ladders, and electricity.
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This member has said "Thank you." to TraceMalin for this useful post:
I only want to weigh in on one point, that being "changed behavior/habituation." I only have my own experience to go on, so perhaps this is anecdotal evidence, but I feel it shows that this habituation does occur. I worked on a liveaboard that did shark feeds for almost ten years. Depending on itinerary they were done once a week. When we initially started doing the chumsickle feeds it would take upwards of an hour to get any sharks to come in for the chum. After six months of weekly feedings, the sharks would swarm and surround the boat before any chum was dropped. We would leave the Bahamas for six months and go to Belize where we did not feed. Upon arrival back in the Bahamas (after six months) there would be virtually no sharks when we dropped the chum, but after a month or so of weekly feedings they would once again circle the boat waiting to be fed. I saw this year-after-year with very few exceptions. Based on my own personal experiences, sharks do, in fact, change their behaviors (especially over time).
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Last edited by cappyjon431; February 26th, 2008 at 02:33 PM.
Reason: typo
These 2 members have said "Thank you." to cappyjon431 for this useful post:
More information than earlier articles, however, it still just declares that the victim bled to death on the way to the hospital, without siting a source.
I've searched, and have not found a coroner's, pathologist's, or any medical examiner's final report on this. The Miami-Dade ME's office still has not commented. How do they know he exsanguinated?
I don't imagine his family will be comforted one way or the other, however, the sensationalism of "...man bleeds to death after shark almost tears leg off..." is pathetic... (Makes better reading than "...man suffers arterial gas embolism after encounter with toothy pelagic...").
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I think there is a powerful arguement that Jim's web site doesn't properly convey the danger of diving with these sharks and that people may be lulled into a false sense of safety.
Just curious what message or wording would convey that message clearly?
More information than earlier articles, however, it still just declares that the victim bled to death on the way to the hospital, without siting a source.
I've searched, and have not found a coroner's, pathologist's, or any medical examiner's final report on this. The Miami-Dade ME's office still has not commented. How do they know he exsanguinated?
I don't imagine his family will be comforted one way or the other, however, the sensationalism of "...man bleeds to death after shark almost tears leg off..." is pathetic... (Makes better reading than "...man suffers arterial gas embolism after encounter with toothy pelagic...").
I've read on one of the Miami Herald articles that the Medical Examiner has not commented pending an investigation.
If you have some evidence that sensational news stories about shark attacks where shark feeding is implicated don't give momentum to movements to ban feeding, please provide it.
The bans and legislative response were the worst form of "knee jerk reaction".
Up and down the coastal areas where the shark attacks were taking place, there were piers with constant chumming and fishing taking place right next to swimmers in the water--in fact, I have a video of this at the Lake Worth pier , right at the swimming beach--you can see blood pouring into the water only about 30 feet from a bunch of little children swimming.
Was there any serious discussion about shutting down the fishing piers, or kicking the surf fisherman out of the water? There was NEVER any chance of this. What we had was "scapegoating"
