Shark attack, Egypt, Brothers islands

[Scott from LongIsland]

It is probably a mistake to view an OWT, or any other apex predator, as "friendly." Bumping can often be a precursor to a bite. Of course, I would rather have a shark bump my camera than my leg, but neither action would make me feel less at risk.

My apologies...i was using the term friendly facetiously...

 

[InTheDrink]

It is probably a mistake to view an OWT, or any other apex predator, as "friendly." Bumping can often be a precursor to a bite. Of course, I would rather have a shark bump my camera than my leg, but neither action would make me feel less at risk.

Nearly all interactions are curiousity and I wouldn’t view as particularly risky. Thousands of divers this year alone have dived with the sharks without incident.

That said, as I previously remarked, when there’s food in the water, visible or not, and their behaviour changes, it’s best to call it a day. Their change in bahviour is fairly distinctive.

I wish the injured diver the very best and trust that this incident will be a significant call to arms for boats to up their game. It’s a shame it had to come to this tho.

 

[Altamira]

My apologies...i was using the term friendly facetiously...

Thank you for clarifying. There are a lot of new divers on SB, and I did not want them to think a shark bump is a friendly gesture.

 

[Mnut]

I was on a liveaboard in Egypten last week and we went diving at Brothers.
We where told about the shark attack that happend the week before,but we still went in the water.
Then at the last day of diving at brothers our divemaster was very close to being bitten by a whitetip.He and another diver was ending the dive as the last persons.All other divers was already in the zodiac.
None of us had seen the shark on the dive before it suddently was around the zodiac and divemaster.It was circling around him and tried to bump him.He had to fight it of while we was trying to get im in the zodiac.
The divemaster was pretty shaken up and had been diving there 1000 times before without any inccidents.

 

[InTheDrink]

You quite often get the longis under the zodiacs at the end of the dive. They’re attracted by the zodiacs, SMBs etc. It can result in interesting exits from the water but it’s normally fine. If it gave your guide the willies tho it must have been getting overly friendly as he would be used to get in with longis around. Of course everyone is probs I a little more on edge since the accident the other week.

 

[Neilwood]

I was on a liveaboard in Egypten last week and we went diving at Brothers.
We where told about the shark attack that happend the week before,but we still went in the water.
Then at the last day of diving at brothers our divemaster was very close to being bitten by a whitetip.He and another diver was ending the dive as the last persons.All other divers was already in the zodiac.
None of us had seen the shark on the dive before it suddently was around the zodiac and divemaster.It was circling around him and tried to bump him.He had to fight it of while we was trying to get im in the zodiac.
The divemaster was pretty shaken up and had been diving there 1000 times before without any inccidents.

Unfortunately the feeding incidents have probably changed the sharks behaviour with regards to divers - this will more than likely take a while to return to normal.

When I was at Brothers last year, the sharks had very little interest in any divers.

 

[BlueTrin]

Unfortunately the feeding incidents have probably changed the sharks behaviour with regards to divers - this will more than likely take a while to return to normal.

When I was at Brothers last year, the sharks had very little interest in any divers.

I was wondering how smart is a shark, let’s say compared to a dolphin ?
I need to google that when I am back from work.

 

[InTheDrink]

Not very. They’re smart enough to learn to follow boats, dolphins, SMBs, Zodiacs, other items of interest. But they’re nowhere near as clever as a mamlian brain.

So when there’s food in the water they react one way. When there’s not they react another. I’m not an expert but for Longimanus ever day is a brand new day. Apex predators for a long time. They haven’t evolved a whole lot. Still beautiful tho.

 

[BlueTrin]

Not very. They’re smart enough to learn to follow boats, dolphins, SMBs, Zodiacs, other items of interest. But they’re nowhere near as clever as a mamlian brain.

So when there’s food in the water they react one way. When there’s not they react another. I’m not an expert but for Longimanus ever day is a brand new day. Apex predators for a long time. They haven’t evolved a whole lot. Still beautiful tho.

Isn’t it a bit of a stretch to say that we can change their behaviour ?

I understand that feeding them can make them aggressive but some people imply here that this can lead them to change medium term their behaviour with humans.

Is there any research on this or is this just wild speculation ?

 

[HalcyonDaze]

Isn’t it a bit of a stretch to say that we can change their behaviour ?

I understand that feeding them can make them aggressive but some people imply here that this can lead them to change medium term their behaviour with humans.

Is there any research on this or is this just wild speculation ?

I'm kind of curious about that myself. I'm wondering what's more likely to key OWs up - a few boats dumping small quantities of chopped-up food or outright feeding them, or an opportunistic predator encountering a floundering diver. The former could still have an impact, but we've noted mistakes made by the divers in the originally posted footage that the shark could have interpreted as vulnerability. That's a much shorter cause-and-effect linkage.