Sharks and Vibration

[supergaijin]

I just found this .pdf while doing a bit of surfin. There is an interesting story about a GW attack and rebuttal. Never saw it before here but it may well have been posted before as it was from 1996

http://216.92.75.75/FAQ/getattachment.php?data=OXxzaGFyay5wZGY=

 

[Rick Murchison]

The shark & sonar debate has been going for a very long time indeed. As far back as '72 after Rob Temple was killed by oceanic white tips there were speculations like this:
"Aftermath: this attack in 1972 was widely reported and shark experts
speculate that the oceanic whitetips may have been attracted and then
stimulated by the low frequency sound in the water from the nearby
submarine testing."
I think this is a case of "shark experts" confusing concurrence with causation. Sightings of oceanic whitetips in this area had been reported by the same divers before. Oceanic whitetips have been maneaters long before sonar and continue to be maneaters today. They are one of the species whose presence will cause me to get out of the water *right now!*
Rick

 

[danvolker]

The shark & sonar debate has been going for a very long time indeed. As far back as '72 after Rob Temple was killed by oceanic white tips there were speculations like this:
"Aftermath: this attack in 1972 was widely reported and shark experts
speculate that the oceanic whitetips may have been attracted and then
stimulated by the low frequency sound in the water from the nearby
submarine testing."
I think this is a case of "shark experts" confusing concurrence with causation. Sightings of oceanic whitetips in this area had been reported by the same divers before. Oceanic whitetips have been maneaters long before sonar and continue to be maneaters today. They are one of the species whose presence will cause me to get out of the water *right now!*
Rick

If you talk to Jimmy Abernethy, you get a whole different spin on the ocenaic white tips.....He has been doing many Oceanic White tip dives with his Liveaboard business, taking 12 divers on free swimming dives with them, even at night.
He says they are very curious sharks, and with sharks, curious means they like to do test bites. All the divers need is a camera that the shark would then run into, and then it turns off. Sharks of the Bahamas :: Jim Abernethy's Scuba Adventures
Jimmy is insistant that there is no such thing as a "maneater"..kind of a "religious point" with him
He has also done countless dives with Great Whites....His take on them, as "Ambush Predators", is that if you want good video, getting in a cave makes the GW's feel safer and bolder, and they will come in closer for good footage....When he has done free swims with them, they are so nervous that they really will not come in close enough or stay nearby long enough, for good footage most of the time. His preferred encounter species, is the tiger Shark, and if you see the movie he stars in ( Sharks, This is your Ocean), you would see his 14 foot tiger shark friend Emma....the relationship seems like man and dog...and the scenes shot impossible to fake with Hollywood effects!

 

[Rick Murchison]

If you talk to Jimmy Abernethy, you get a whole different spin on the ocenaic white tips.....

Suggest you read Gilliam's account of the attack on Temple, and any of the articles/books on the sinking of the Indianapolis.
Then make your own decision on how to react to oceanic whitetips nearby.
Mine is "get out of the water."

Rick

 

[danvolker]

Suggest you read Gilliam's account of the attack on Temple, and any of the articles/books on the sinking of the Indianapolis.
Then make your own decision on how to react to oceanic whitetips nearby.
Mine is "get out of the water."

Rick

Selling a book can "color" the issues
First Hand experience is what I am suggesting....why don't you guys with the passionate interest, find out first hand yourselves ?

 

[supergaijin]

Knowing the little I know about Mr Longhands- it's an unpredictable species that is the cause of a lot of trouble especially with surface swimmers and the uninitiated. People react to Longimanus which can trigger a different set of responses from initial curiosity. And then they just have the size to be hardcore as they want- as was shown in the 1972 Temple encounter.

Predatory shark species of a certain size ie. GW, Bull, Tiger, Longimanus are always to be respected but have very different personalities at different locals and at different times of year. The same Tiger that can be dived with in say, French Polynesia becomes a very different animal when it swims to Hawaii. Same thing with the GWs migrating between Oz and NZ. Time and place....