In less than a year, at least three influencers have been bitten by sharks in on-camera incidents, as a rise in social media content creators swimming with the sea creatures has worried experts. Scientists are issuing warnings, reminding influencers that safety instructions exist for a reason—and they’ll only disobey them once.
Experts say they are seeing videos 'every single week now' of people swimming dangerously close, touching sharks, and even riding them. Kristian Parton, a shark scientist and host of the Shark Bytes YouTube channel, said he’s seeing such cases 'way more' than ever before. 'We’re going to see people ending up in really serious incidents with sharks,' he predicted.
Recent Incidents Highlight the Dangers
In April, Tayane Dalazen, a 37-year-old lawyer from Sao Paulo, almost lost her leg after a 7ft nurse shark clamped its jaws around her thigh and held her underwater for several seconds during a shark-diving trip on the Brazilian coast. Recalling the incident, she told BBC News: 'There were a lot of them. Later, I discovered [the tour organisers] were feeding the sharks so that they would interact with the tourists.' Dalazen felt 'strong pain' from pressure on her leg but knew she had to 'stay calm' as she wouldn’t be able to fight off the animal. She was left with lacerations to her thigh, describing the whole thing as 'very frightening'. Footage of her near-miss has been viewed millions of times online, and she admitted she should’ve kept a safer distance, despite not being there with the intention of getting social content.
Just last month, another influencer faced losing his leg after an attack by a reef shark while spearfishing. These incidents followed a Chinese content creator getting bitten in December while in the Maldives. Also last year, a holidaymaker in the Caribbean had both hands bitten off when she tried to take a photo of a bull shark. While only in hip-deep water at the time on her trip to the Turks and Caicos Islands, the woman, in her fifties, was circled by the shark, which bit her leg and cut off both her hands when she tried to protect herself, one at mid-forearm and the other at the wrist. Her husband managed to 'wrestle away' the shark, but the incident was described as a 'living nightmare'.
Fatal Encounters and Expert Warnings
Merely two months after that, a 40-year-old snorkeller in Israel was killed by sharks after using a GoPro to 'fend them off'. The father-of-four had hoped to feed the sharks from a distance but was then dragged out to sea as an eyewitness cried, 'They’re eating him!' Experts have said that photographers and influencers are most likely to ignore safety guidelines.
According to Save Our Seas, only about a dozen of more than 500 known shark species have ever fatally injured a human. Most pose no threat to humans. However, sharks roughly 6ft and deemed 'predatory' have the teeth and jaws capable of inflicting severe injury. Three members of this group – the white shark, tiger shark, and bull shark – are known to inflict the bulk of shark bites on humans. The International Shark Attack File compiles data of shark bites dating back to the 1500s, and it says between 70 and 100 people are bitten each year at present. Some prove fatal, but most cause minor injuries.
As for the reasons why a shark might attack, there are numerous theories. Most are believed to occur not as a predatory swipe, but out of confusion, fear, or curiosity. Parton added that if sharks become 'stressed out', whether it be in a nursery habitat, breeding ground, or feeding area, they’re being 'deprived of an area that’s important for them to survive'. 'And that’s definitely a problem,' he said.
Call for Caution
Parton drew an analogy: 'You wouldn’t walk into the Serengeti and try and put your hand on the face of a lion.' The trend of swimming with sharks for content is leading to increasingly dangerous situations, and experts are urging influencers to respect safety guidelines and the animals' space.
