Cape Cod... too dangerous or okay?

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For cape cod bay, it really helps to have a boat, doesn't have to be a big one. That being said there are good shore dive locations like Sandwich (shallow enjoyable easy dive). As far as the sharks are concerned, since I boat dive, I am much more concerned about finding the anchor line at the end of the dive. Sometimes the current in the bay can be a little more than you expect and if you overshoot the boat on the return trip it makes for a tough swim up current. That said, I have boated all over cape cod bay for years and have not see a GW yet.

I have done a lot of boating around Cape Cod over the last 25 years and have done some diving, I've seen big shark fins near Monomoy Island on 2 occasions(there are thousands of seals beached on this island). My boat has been moored in Falmouth for a few years so have been diving there and will do a lot more. There are a lot of nice wrecks around Martha's Vineyard and the Elizabeth Islands but the current is strong and visibility can be bad. There are no seals close to the north side of Martha's Vineyard so I feel good about diving there, although there was a large great white in one of Falmouth salt ponds a few yews ago.

I just did a google search, there was a person killed last year in Massachusetts by a shark, he was on a boogie board near a seal area, he was the first person killed by a shark in MA in 80 years.

By the way, Having a flashing strobe on the anchor line is a good thing to do to.
 
Not Cape Cod - NJ shore - about 3.5 miles off shore in about 75 to 85 feet of water.
I was laying lobster hotels down - Home Depot buckets with half a lid screwed on and weighted on the bottom. Not traps but homes for lobsters to get fat dumb and happy and for me to check in a month or so and be happy. Anyway - I was down over 30 minutes and it was a bright sunny day. Started my way up the anchor line and started doing my 5 safety stop at 20 feet - probably about 15 foot of viz. Mind you 15 foot is not bad for this area. I then felt the back of my neck hairs standing on end - mind you I am still underwater and have never had this feeling before. Something was not right and the feeling of dread was all over me. I just swallowed and thought suck it up - but my throat was dry and I was not feeling like I was 5 minutes ago. So I started looking around - I looked up over my shoulder and a shadow started going over and a bit away from me and it looked like maybe a cloud was passing but I could not shake the jitters. Slowly, slowly, slowly this shape or cloud passed maybe 10 or 15 seconds passed - but I could not define the shape. It was too big for me to dismiss - it passed and the sun was shining again and I was happy to see the rays of sunshine. I finished my stop and got back to the boat - I asked my buddy did a whale pass by - he was clueless and had no idea what I was talking about. Mind you, no clouds in the sky were to be found - bright sunny NJ day.
To this day I believe it was a Great White - I can't prove it but something was watching me and moving very slowly and what I believe was very deliberately. I will never know but it was one of the 5 times in the water I was not sure I was coming out. And when I got out I was very happy to be on board. Sometimes - I don't think they hit hit fast but are curious - at least that is how it felt to me.
Left me feeling a bit unsettled...

That reminds of an experience I had last year. Last June I was diving the Coney Island (also off the NJ shore) and was poking my head down in one of the hatches. When I looked up my buddy (actually none other than @doctormike) was very excited and pointing at something, signaling shark, etc. I squinted my best in the direction he pointed but couldn't make out anything more than a quickly vanishing shadow.

When we got back on the boat I learned a white shark had cruised by him. It's clearly an unusual sighting for the area. Later one of the crew went down to pull the hook, when he got back on board he said we weren't gonna believe it but he had definitely seen a white shark down there while untying us from the wreck. I always assume they are down there with us, but being in the water while people are sighting them made me stop and think for a minute.

Edit:
Personally I'd love to see one (and that's it -- I'd need a signed contract from the shark before the encounter). Though I'd certainly rather not see one than get harassed -- got plenty of that when I was last in FL.
 
If people really knew how many sharks there were in the waters from NJ to MA they probably wouldn't get in the water. I regularly fish for them. In the last 5 years we have hooked atleast 300. We typically only keep 2 a year. 1 mako and 1 thresher.

On a usual trip we pick a site to dive near where we will be fishing. Last year we were on the USS Bass and saw close to 15 sharks while hanging on the line. We got out of the water. Changed clothes. Then threw chum in and hooked 7 in 45 minutes. Mostly blues, 1 dusky. All released.

In the years of diving these waters I have never encountered a problem. They don't seem to like bubbles. It does make one wonder when closed circuit and on a long hang what is really under you. But I don't think you would ever see it coming.

* not trying to give you nightmares.
 
Cue the music...

I only saw 1 shark swimming near me off MA... It was only about 2' long but then I thought, hmmm, where's your mom? Then I started to keep an eye out just in case...
 
If people really knew how many sharks there were in the waters from NJ to MA they probably wouldn't get in the water. I regularly fish for them. In the last 5 years we have hooked atleast 300. We typically only keep 2 a year. 1 mako and 1 thresher.

On a usual trip we pick a site to dive near where we will be fishing. Last year we were on the USS Bass and saw close to 15 sharks while hanging on the line. We got out of the water. Changed clothes. Then threw chum in and hooked 7 in 45 minutes. Mostly blues, 1 dusky. All released.

In the years of diving these waters I have never encountered a problem. They don't seem to like bubbles. It does make one wonder when closed circuit and on a long hang what is really under you. But I don't think you would ever see it coming.

* not trying to give you nightmares.

"If people really knew how many sharks there were in the waters from NJ to MA they probably wouldn't get in the water"
If sharks saw humans as a food source we probably wouldn't be able to go into the water!

I've only encountered 1 shark in NE waters a blue shark. In North Carolina I get to swim with hundreds of sand tiger sharks on some of the wrecks. They circle the wrecks while divers are there, I sometimes get into the group and swim with them for a few circles. They really remind me more of dogs the way they act. The bubble part I'm too sure of, seals blow bubbles at the sharks but they still end up as lunch. It is mostly true that the shark you don't see is the one that bites.
 
If people really knew how many sharks there were in the waters from NJ to MA they probably wouldn't get in the water. I regularly fish for them. In the last 5 years we have hooked atleast 300. We typically only keep 2 a year. 1 mako and 1 thresher.

On a usual trip we pick a site to dive near where we will be fishing. Last year we were on the USS Bass and saw close to 15 sharks while hanging on the line. We got out of the water. Changed clothes. Then threw chum in and hooked 7 in 45 minutes. Mostly blues, 1 dusky. All released.

In the years of diving these waters I have never encountered a problem. They don't seem to like bubbles. It does make one wonder when closed circuit and on a long hang what is really under you. But I don't think you would ever see it coming.

* not trying to give you nightmares.

At least when I get eaten I will be enjoying my very affordable trimix lol
 
We ran into a young blue shark at Nubble Light, with 5-7 foot adults circling just out of sight. We were out farther than we thought and the depth was about 75 feet. I saw seals there last year.
 
We got three 8' - 10' thresher sharks while fishing for bluefin tuna in cape cod bay a few years ago, but while diving I've only seen dog fish at cape cod. I've seen big nurse sharks and spinner sharks diving in Fla, my attitude is that I would not mind seeing them diving on the cape, obviously am not wanting a bad experience. While I admit I don't have a fraction of the shark diving experience as some of the divers on this forum, but it seems to me that a diver is about 1000 times more likely to be injured while driving thru the traffic going to the cape compared to being injured by a shark while diving on the cape(this concept has been covered in other threads). There are no dive shops left on the cape because shark hysteria has scared the divers away.

The places where there are thousands of seals are further east in Chatham and Nantucket etc. Where I dive is closer to Rhode Island than it is to Chatham. RI is a very busy dive destination, many divers are in the water every day of the summer.(my western most dive spot[when launching from Falmouth] is about 10 miles from RI)

If someone wants to jump on my boat and join me for a dive on the wreck of the Port Hunter this summer then let me know, from there it's a 5 minute boat ride to where they filmed much of the movie JAWS. (there were no live sharks in that movie)
shark_with_tank_01.jpg
 
Sharks aside, is sandwich beach still divable? Looks like all the sand got moved around. Any lobsters left?
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/perdix-ai/

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