Any diver out there been attacked by a big shark?!

[jeffsky29]

I recently moved to Florida and I finally saw my first bull shark, actually 2 of them. One was an 8 footer. It was incredibly exciting to finally see a supposedly aggressive shark on a dive. At first I did not take my eyes off of him/her, for fear of it coming up behind me. The longer I watched him, the more I relaxed and realized he had little to no interest in me. I was way more interested in them, than they were in me. Had I been spearfishing and had a wounded or dead fish on me, I am sure their interest would have been different. And, if I had been spearfishing and had any catch, I would have gladly given it to either one of them, without them even asking .

I look forward to seeing many more Bulls, Black Tips, Lemons and someday a Great Hammerhead!

 

[jeffsky29]

valve actuation

Got ya, so you leave it off when diving, which I know safer. I leave mine on and have the second stage under my chin with surgical rubber. If something went wrong with my primary setup, I like to know I am a second away from breathing, without having to turn any knobs. However, I do realize this could be a terrible surprise if my pony went empty without me knowing. I do have a pressure gauge on the first stage, but I think it is time for either a pony pressure gauge on a hose or a second shearwater transmitter. Thanks!

 

[martincohn]

Should we add advice here about sanitizing the inside of the wetsuit after a close call, or would that be a split off thread?

Naw, but links to the new specialty card for crappy wetsuit abatement would be nice.

 

[martincohn]

They would only do that when we had spearguns when diving the same area without the spearguns we never had problems.

I'll take a guess it had nothing to do with the speargun.

 

[Belzelbub]

I recently moved to Florida and I finally saw my first bull shark, actually 2 of them. One was an 8 footer. It was incredibly exciting to finally see a supposedly aggressive shark on a dive. At first I did not take my eyes off of him/her, for fear of it coming up behind me. The longer I watched him, the more I relaxed and realized he had little to no interest in me. I was way more interested in them, than they were in me. Had I been spearfishing and had a wounded or dead fish on me, I am sure their interest would have been different. And, if I had been spearfishing and had any catch, I would have gladly given it to either one of them, without them even asking .

I've seen a few through the years. Usually while spearfishing.

There are two schools of thought on what to do when you encounter a shark while spearfishing.
1st school is to give up the catch.
2nd school is to try not to.

I subscribe to the second school. When I first started spearfishing, I attended a few seminars put on by a local speargun manufacturer. He knows quite a bit about spearing and sharks, as in his previous career, he was a commercial spearo for something like 20 years, and was also a commercial shark fisherman. Though he liked to avoid this topic altogether, he hesitantly told what he did for those 20 some years. IIRC, in all those years, he's only had to dispatch 3 sharks. His tactic was to go on the offense a bit when he would first see a shark. That didn't mean firing at the shark, but he would usually extend the speargun and move toward the shark. He had a few reasons for doing this. First, when a shark first approaches it is curious. When curious, they can usually be persuaded to move along. When amped up, very little will persuade them. Second, prey usually flees, so when something is advancing, it must not be prey. Third (or 2B), sharks don't like to be prey. If wounded, they wouldn't stand much chance, so if that thing with the bubbles is not prey, maybe it's another predator, so the shark will usually back off. Of course, all that needs to happen early, and sometimes it's not enough if the shark is in full feed mode.

 

[TMHeimer]

Mine as well. The shark is bigger than I am, and it has rather sharp teeth. Two very good reasons for keeping a healthy distance.

Nature isn't a petting zoo. It's literally a dog eat dog (or rather, animal eat animal) world. And wild animals are... not domesticated.

I don't even like things that approach half my size. Was diving on the Florida panhandle and buddy & I ran into a school of Southern Rays. He followed them, I signaled this is where we split up....

 

[Storker]

I like to have some info about the animal's behavior. If the animal is docile, I can live with a fairly large one being rather close. If the animal is known to be somewhat aggressive, I prefer keeping a healthy distance. If I know crap about the animal, I prefer to keep a healthy distance.

But each diver ought to do their research and find out what they consider due diligence.

 

[Scuba-74]

Has there ever been a case where a scuba diver was attacked by a shark like one of the top three deadly ones the great white bull and tiger? Has there been a case where diver was able to defend himself or herself just with a dive knife?

I'm thinking a small spear would've worked better or an underwater stun gun

Never been there personally, but I hear that oceanic white tips attack divers periodically in Red Sea. If you search youtube, you will find a video of a pretty nasty attack on a German diver that occurred last winter I believe. They even stopped liveaboard trips to the area for a while.

 

[mcohen1021]

I've never been attacked by a big shark, but I was attacked by a fat barracuda - my ex!

 

[NAUI Wowie]

Has there ever been a case where a scuba diver was attacked by a shark like one of the top three deadly ones the great white bull and tiger? Has there been a case where diver was able to defend himself or herself just with a dive knife?

I'm thinking a small spear would've worked better or an underwater stun gun

Is it near Komodo that DMs use big sticks? Somewhere out there they always carry big sticks.