Sharks from species once thought harmless kill and eat snorkeler in feeding frenzy

[marmar]

A 40-year-old male tourist was swimming and filming about 100m from shore in Hadera off the coast of Israel in April when he was suddenly surrounded by a shiver of dusky sharks, a species generally considered to be harmless to humans.

Witness testimonies suggest a shark reportedly lunged at his GoPro camera. Witnesses then heard him shouting: “Help… they’re biting me,” before he disappeared from sight as the water turned red and some shark fins could be seen on the surface. By the time rescue boats could arrive, the water was bloodied and the man was gone, local reports say.

“The day after, searches at sea recovered human remains (in very small quantities) that allowed the forensic confirmation of the victim’s identity, but also led to the conclusion that he had been devoured by ‘several’ sharks during this incident,” researchers wrote.

The report, published in the journal Ethology, documents the first known instance of a dusky shark – a species with no known record of killing humans – fatally attacking a diver during a feeding frenzy. ................(more)

https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/sharks-species-once-thought-harmless-081012657.html

[IbogaProject]

1. Over fishing is part of this

Excessive fishing is really depleting the stock of fish. And it is altering the balance of aquatic species.

[Baitball Blogger]

2. What a way to find out.

[maxsolomon]

11. The sharks are being fed scraps to attract them for snorkeling tourists.

See my link and snips @10 below.

[displacedvermoter]

3. Hamas linked sharks perhaps?

I found myself -- and millions of other good folks -- linked to Hamas last weekend. And Trump hates sharks, so there is a good chance he will tie this all together.

[GreenWave]

8. nice lateral thinking!

[Aristus]

4. Did people think we could just kill the oceans

and the wildlife wouldn’t retaliate?

[Mysterian]

5. Sharks gotta eat

and meat is meat.

[Hey Joe]

6. Maybe the earth and some of its inhabitants

are turning against its enemies? The conditions we have caused may be having
consequences.
We have done great harm to her.

[Gaugamela]

7. Sharks can detect the electromagnetic fields of their prey. Sounds like the Go-Pro

set off the whole incident.

[GreenWave]

9. Now we know what to get Trump for ChristmaS.

[maxsolomon]

10. Apparently, this happened in April. Humans are feeding them scraps.

https://www.iflscience.com/first-fatality-involving-a-dusky-shark-caused-by-begging-behavior-as-humans-feed-them-scraps-80504

The first documented case of a person being killed by a dusky shark occurrred in April 2025. Now, new research has raised concerns that the extremely rare attack may have been motivated by a kind of “begging behavior” that’s been encouraged by years of humans feeding the sharks in the region scraps.

“Artificial feeding, when it is regulated and monitored by authorities, can have massive benefits for ecotourism and local economies as well as improve the perception of sharks in terms of people being able to see them and spend time in the water with them,” said Kristian Parton, a marine biologist and shark scientist from the University of Exeter, in a release. “There are lots of places around the world where there are provisioning sites that work well, but there are others where there’s just no enforcement, no regulations – where people are able to get into the water with their own food.”

“Sadly, in Hadera it wasn’t being done in the right way.”

On April 21, a man was snorkeling in the waters off Hadera Beach in Israel when the attack took place. He had a GoPro camera, which may have contributed to the first shark biting him as it would have been emitting a slight electromagnetic signal that the researchers say could have been misidentified as potential prey.

It’s possible that the bite aimed at the camera instead bit the snorkeler, wounding him. The resulting sound and olfactory stimuli as he began bleeding then triggered a feeding frenzy, resulting in several sharks engaging in predation bites.