Shark kills Diver

[lagerfran]

I am one of the divers who dove with Jim Abernathy. I have over 1200 dives and Sharks are my favorite fish. To me this was one of the ultimate shark dives. It was very structured towards safety and all divers were thoroughly briefed on how to watch for and act around these sharks.

Why did I do this dive - because I have dove for over 25 years and still had not seen a tiger shark and well I wanted to see one. I knew of Jim's professionalism and how many divers have been in the water with him so that's why I picked his boat.

Common sense is always the rule - but things do happen. I live in Florida, some day I may get struck by lightning, it is the lightning capital of the world. But I will not avoid going outdoors.

For those who say "blood in the water" - fish oil is what attracts those sharks. And unfortunately accidents do happen and I am sorry for this mans family.

But I for one will not quit diving with sharks. Maybe if the world stopped killing so many of them, divers would not have to go out seeking them in this manner.

 

[Black_3000psi]

"you don't have do stupid to know its stupid" capt. Mike of the Enzo owner of Diamond Head Divers told me this after one of my crazy shore dives. I thought about it for a long time and realized that he was right. while it is in our nature to test, and challenge ourselves, those are some of the moments when we feel so alive, that moment burned into our memory. I would like to think we all have a few of those, I am equally sure many of us have experienced those close calls that made you wonder why you were still alive after doing "stupid". you want to know whats not natural about chumming? hey, this is a completely normal occurrence right I mean we leave the dock every day and see miles and miles of chum slicks, yep must have been a bolt of knife lightning, no wait it was a fish slashing done by not so hungry sharks so they could come back later when they where hungry. now that makes perfectly good sense to me. now its ok because I have rationalized it and it works. does it matter that the dive shop is making a killin on these dives? well gee that is the primary objective, its a business.
secondly I keep reading about the numbers the statistics. first lets take into account how long diving has been a recreational sport? add to that the number of dive boats that go out every day. now what is the actual percentage of dive boats that bait sharks every day. not a very high number. so lets say that one out of every ten boats is a bait boat (no cage) now would one of the number crunchers do me a favor (cause I dont count so swell) what is an acceptable number of divers that have to die before we can say "something is wrong"?

and finally I have a question what ever happen to "leave it like you found it" dont feed the bears!!!!! ?????? well it shouldn't take a member of Mensa to figure out that if you should not feed wild animals what logically thinking human being would think it ok to feed sharks in the ocean with divers in the water. well I think most of you can figure it out from here. we are each responsible for calling the dive(for them self) in bad situations. good night