Shark attack, Egypt, Brothers islands

[drrich2]

Aside from whether people will actually follow directions, if such sharks (OWT) are expected to be encountered frequently, I'd suggest that "how to deal with sharks" is not a dive briefing thing but a general briefing they should give on the boat on the first night or whatever. Given at the right time, you will probably get more attention and more questions could be asked and in more depth.

Agreed, and should work well for live-aboard customers. In that region, how many day boats take divers out? The 'work flow' for getting things done on a day boat with a different set of divers day-to-day may differ from a live-aboard. I wonder how commonly tips for encountering OWTs are taught in advance for them? Are the day boat people getting out to sites where they're likely to see OWTs, or is it mainly live-aboards doing so?

Richard.

 

[InTheDrink]

Agreed, and should work well for live-aboard customers. In that region, how many day boats take divers out? The 'work flow' for getting things done on a day boat with a different set of divers day-to-day may differ from a live-aboard. I wonder how commonly tips for encountering OWTs are taught in advance for them? Are the day boat people getting out to sites where they're likely to see OWTs, or is it mainly live-aboards doing so?

Richard.

Day boats can’t go that far

 

[cerich]

Two more attacks last week. Don’t have any proper details yet.

the local OWT have figured out it's a daily buffet.

Either the site needs closing for a few years or there needs to be a culling

 

[scubadada]

Hi @InTheDrink

So now you have tantalized us, especially @cerich. Do have any details, reports?

 

[WS007]

Relevant to the discussion: Red Sea boat crew fined, suspended for feeding fish - Egypt Independent

I am preparing for my next visit to Egypt in February and was looking which vessel to book - it does not look to me that the tours of the MY Amelia Discovery are suspended, at least for a while: the tours are going on just as normal:

M/Y Amelia Discovery Availability - Discovery Divers

Seems to me that with the right amount of bribing everything is possible...

Wolfgang

 

[chillyinCanada]

the local OWT have figured out it's a daily buffet.

Either the site needs closing for a few years or there needs to be a culling

Culling?
That's crazy. Hope that doesn't happen

 

[scubaozy]

Yes, culling didn’t do any good in Australia. Sharks are important source of income for the locals and we divers would like to continue diving with them. In 2010, there was a short period of witch-hunt after the attacks and it took a lot of negative publicity that I imagine local officials have realized that it is not an option anymore.
Improvement in diver training and behavior, restricting number of boats certain time of the year, additional training and certification of the operators, tighter control of authorities will have more positive impact on the outcome.

 

[cerich]

Yes, culling didn’t do any good in Australia. Sharks are important source of income for the locals and we divers would like to continue diving with them. In 2010, there was a short period of witch-hunt after the attacks and it took a lot of negative publicity that I imagine local officials have realized that it is not an option anymore.
Improvement in diver training and behavior, restricting number of boats certain time of the year, additional training and certification of the operators, tighter control of authorities will have more positive impact on the outcome.

This is a specific site that has had incidents and the reports are the OWT have gotten more aggressive to divers. Unless one wants to not care to make a buck, one of the elements has to be removed or there will be more issues.

I would prefer a couple year break from diving there, that is very unlikely, a cull is more likely. That said scull would work as long as human behavior such as feeding them stops. Otherwise the pattern will repeat.

This is a man made problem and the sharks will suffer to resolve because people want their shark encounters and could care less the cost to the sharks or others.

 

[HalcyonDaze]

Hi @InTheDrink

So now you have tantalized us, especially @cerich. Do have any details, reports?

I also would like to hear some actual details, seeing as we now have someone who's taking the rumor mill seriously and calling for a shark cull. Again, if I were to identify a culprit for "more aggression," it would be a heightened number of goobers encountering the species. Viewing sharks as "death fish from hell" is one extreme, but not respecting their capabilities as wild predators is a ticket to get hurt.

I showed that clip to someone who formerly worked at the International Shark Attack File and has experience with OWs at that site; his take-home message boiled down to the overall group being completely oblivious to what was happening. Everyone either acted like it was just a big fish getting "curious" or didn't even seem to notice.

Rewatching the clip, I have to wonder if what happened was the divers getting in the shark's space. Three seconds into the clip a burst of bubbles seems to irritate it; it turns around and descends towards the group and the shorty diver flails right into its path, after which it seems to try going after his bare, kicking legs. Afterwards it makes a circuit, but is now completely surrounded by bubbling divers moving closer for pictures. It then circles back, runs into the shorty diver again and gets aggressive; one thing I noticed was that pass ends with the diver and shark both swimming parallel for the wall and it almost looks like the shark's trying to get ahead of the diver and swim around to the right (out of the group). It kind of looks like that didn't work and the shark broke left; then its path gets blocked by the sidemount diver chugging along like he's practicing frog kicks in the pool. I'm not even sure he turns his head to track the shark. At that point, I can see the shark just being bloody peeved and deciding it's going to make an impolite exit; again, I would be interested to know if it came back for the wounded diver or figured it had made its point and bolted. Of course, we also don't see how it was behaving before the clip starts; it could be it was already agitated.

 

[InTheDrink]

Hi @InTheDrink

So now you have tantalized us, especially @cerich. Do have any details, reports?

This is information I have:

Red Sea Sharks today: 'Again the internet/facebook are overflowing with rumours and misinformation... here are the facts about two incidents involving oceanic whitetip sharks and divers at Small Brother last week:
Two days apart, two different diving guests were bitten; one bite resulted in damaged diving equipment (BCD), the other in a minor injury (lacerations) to the side of the hip. The diver was released from the hospital already after receiving a few stitches.
He was part of a small group of divers that were hanging on to the anchor line of one of the mooring liveaboards at the time.'