OP
Again to answer the posts above...
With reference to the "invasion of habitat" theme - we co-exist with many different dangerous species - bears, wolves, tigers, sharks - whatever. Generally speaking, they do their own thing and we do ours. Yes, we are the invaders and they are the natural inhabitants of their environment but I re-iterate - when I say the behaviour is "wrong" - it is perhaps a misunderstanding of my expression. I might say a person has "gone wrong" when they decide to walk into a school and shoot children - I am not talking about morals, I am talking about a deviation from the norm. Shark attacks are rare, and the consistent, repeated, aggressive behaviour of the shark in question is not typical of the species, and we have dived here for decades without too many problems. Yes, attacks have occurred before, but not in this fashion. I am not judging morals of either humans or sharks. We are probably to blame, but who can see into the mind of any other creature?
What I write here is information given to me by people directly involved in the investigation. They have seen the injuries inflicted, they have spoken to people who are witnesses to the initial attack.
Somebody asked why the Danish snorkellers would lie about the attack - they probably didn't, but there was no shark involved in the incident. There are several large mackerel type fish that frequent the area - Tuna, Trevallies, Spanish Mackerel and especially milkfish which look very shark-like and can grow to a big size.
I am doing my best to relate the facts as best I know.
Somebody suggested that there might have been a sudden increase of dangerous fish here - not true, sharks are not suddenly coming to sharm - in fact, their population has been severely depleted over the years. Shark Reef and Shark Observatory were named because back in the late 70s and early 80s, you could go there and see 20 sharks per dive. I have never seen a shark at either of these sites.
Sharm has been overfished, yes. The tourist population has gone from 90% divers to 10% divers, over 600,000 people get in the water here every year. Sheep are dumped overboard - cows also, in the past, and sorry to say, a lot of the Egyptian staff here are not well educated and think they are doing the world a favour by catching them - and also it brings them money that they would not get otherwise - same as it does in the caribbean or asia pacific region.
We try our best to educate, and it fails because the almighty dollar/yen/euro/yuan wins every time. The amount of edible waste thrown into the water by cheap tourists and boat crews who have to pay money to have their own trash removed is incredible. This is a product of 20 years of greed and ignorance. If somebody offered you a month's wages for a single day in your comfortable office would you turn it down? I do not blame the egyptian staff, but the people higher up in the food chain, as it were, should bear some responsibility.
I am part of that food chain - sharm is my job and my life and I love it here. I would ask people to stop passing judgment on issues they know very little about without seeking the facts. The facts are not in the media - the media exists only to sell papers and influence opinion. The authorities here really are trying their best but this is a new thing, nobody really knows what to do. Already tour operators are cancelling or re-routing their holidays - this will affect the livelihoods of thousands of european staff as well as thousands of egyptians. The sensationlist media has the power to ruin the lives of a lot of people, as well as the already depleted shark population.
Most of us are doing the best we can. Yesterday a group of my friends and colleagues volunteered to put themselves in harms way to track and locate the rogue shark - and it appears they may have succeeded. My job took me away from the area but I would have volunteered anyway. So far it's only attacked swimmers at the surface - that does not guarantee the safety of divers.
Dive operators are not dumping sheep into the ocean to deliberately attract big sharks - this is STUPID thinking. Yes, in the past, people have indeed deliberately attempted to bait the sharks and the liveaboards at Elphinstone last year that are directly responsible for the death of a French lady are not working and are being prosecuted.
A shark has decided, for whatever reason, to attack humans in its own territory. It is uncharacteristic behaviour for the species, and in this area, for the sake of the livelihoods of many people in the area, it must go. That's very sad indeed, but sensationalizing this stuff in the media helps nobody except the media.
I'm going to try and get a personal interview with one of the investigators and if he allows this, I will post everything I can here. I am not doing this solely on behalf of the sharks - if this random hysteria continues, I will have to leave because without the business I cannot afford to stay here.
It's a very unhappy time all around and we are working our backsides off to accomodate every aspect of the industry that is affected.
Peace out,
C.
With reference to the "invasion of habitat" theme - we co-exist with many different dangerous species - bears, wolves, tigers, sharks - whatever. Generally speaking, they do their own thing and we do ours. Yes, we are the invaders and they are the natural inhabitants of their environment but I re-iterate - when I say the behaviour is "wrong" - it is perhaps a misunderstanding of my expression. I might say a person has "gone wrong" when they decide to walk into a school and shoot children - I am not talking about morals, I am talking about a deviation from the norm. Shark attacks are rare, and the consistent, repeated, aggressive behaviour of the shark in question is not typical of the species, and we have dived here for decades without too many problems. Yes, attacks have occurred before, but not in this fashion. I am not judging morals of either humans or sharks. We are probably to blame, but who can see into the mind of any other creature?
What I write here is information given to me by people directly involved in the investigation. They have seen the injuries inflicted, they have spoken to people who are witnesses to the initial attack.
Somebody asked why the Danish snorkellers would lie about the attack - they probably didn't, but there was no shark involved in the incident. There are several large mackerel type fish that frequent the area - Tuna, Trevallies, Spanish Mackerel and especially milkfish which look very shark-like and can grow to a big size.
I am doing my best to relate the facts as best I know.
Somebody suggested that there might have been a sudden increase of dangerous fish here - not true, sharks are not suddenly coming to sharm - in fact, their population has been severely depleted over the years. Shark Reef and Shark Observatory were named because back in the late 70s and early 80s, you could go there and see 20 sharks per dive. I have never seen a shark at either of these sites.
Sharm has been overfished, yes. The tourist population has gone from 90% divers to 10% divers, over 600,000 people get in the water here every year. Sheep are dumped overboard - cows also, in the past, and sorry to say, a lot of the Egyptian staff here are not well educated and think they are doing the world a favour by catching them - and also it brings them money that they would not get otherwise - same as it does in the caribbean or asia pacific region.
We try our best to educate, and it fails because the almighty dollar/yen/euro/yuan wins every time. The amount of edible waste thrown into the water by cheap tourists and boat crews who have to pay money to have their own trash removed is incredible. This is a product of 20 years of greed and ignorance. If somebody offered you a month's wages for a single day in your comfortable office would you turn it down? I do not blame the egyptian staff, but the people higher up in the food chain, as it were, should bear some responsibility.
I am part of that food chain - sharm is my job and my life and I love it here. I would ask people to stop passing judgment on issues they know very little about without seeking the facts. The facts are not in the media - the media exists only to sell papers and influence opinion. The authorities here really are trying their best but this is a new thing, nobody really knows what to do. Already tour operators are cancelling or re-routing their holidays - this will affect the livelihoods of thousands of european staff as well as thousands of egyptians. The sensationlist media has the power to ruin the lives of a lot of people, as well as the already depleted shark population.
Most of us are doing the best we can. Yesterday a group of my friends and colleagues volunteered to put themselves in harms way to track and locate the rogue shark - and it appears they may have succeeded. My job took me away from the area but I would have volunteered anyway. So far it's only attacked swimmers at the surface - that does not guarantee the safety of divers.
Dive operators are not dumping sheep into the ocean to deliberately attract big sharks - this is STUPID thinking. Yes, in the past, people have indeed deliberately attempted to bait the sharks and the liveaboards at Elphinstone last year that are directly responsible for the death of a French lady are not working and are being prosecuted.
A shark has decided, for whatever reason, to attack humans in its own territory. It is uncharacteristic behaviour for the species, and in this area, for the sake of the livelihoods of many people in the area, it must go. That's very sad indeed, but sensationalizing this stuff in the media helps nobody except the media.
I'm going to try and get a personal interview with one of the investigators and if he allows this, I will post everything I can here. I am not doing this solely on behalf of the sharks - if this random hysteria continues, I will have to leave because without the business I cannot afford to stay here.
It's a very unhappy time all around and we are working our backsides off to accomodate every aspect of the industry that is affected.
Peace out,
C.
