Tourist Dies in Recife from Shark Attack

[benjio]

I've discussed this here often. This is probably the 10th attack I've actually been here for, but it's the only time I've been here when an attack resulted in someone's death. The images where not blurred on the local news and in the paper. News reports always differ here but according to beach vendors I know that saw the entire ordeal, the Bull Shark was reportedly around a 5 footer and took almost all the flesh off the bottom half of her leg. She was in the hospital in a coma for a day but for the most part she had already bled out in the water. Usually people are safe on the reef that separates the shallows from the deep side before the continental shelf drops off, but at the beginning stages of high tide there's still about 4 feet of water covering the reef.
 
http://jconline.ne10.uol.com.br/canal/cidades/geral/noticia/2013/07/23/morre-turista-paulista-vitima-de-ataque-de-tubarao-no-recife-91012.php
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hrb4C1maVFc

[V_Man]

Bull sharks are one of the few species that eat people. Unfortunately, shallow water including a long way up stream are part of their normal feeding areas. Avoid the water around dawn and dusk and when bait fish are around.

[Calipro]

Bull sharks are one of the few species that eat people. Unfortunately, shallow water including a long way up stream are part of their normal feeding areas. Avoid the water around dawn and dusk and when bait fish are around.

Knee deep can be too deep.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/719110/Shark-attack-boy-saved-by-uncle.html

[robert angel]

Have to be careful in most ocean areas. I know I shouldn't, but I take my boat out alone and thread my way in and around the barrier islands that are off our shoreline, fishing and crabbing. Plenty of bull sharks there. I like to take a dip in the sea usually 2 or 3 times during a day of fishing and recall one time when I noticed and unusual amount of hammerhead sharks, which scared the bejesus out of me. Some were over ten feet long. Not typically, but they are known to attack. I wear a blacked out watch--no silver or gold, but even w/o a cut, I bet sharks can sense and smell me under water. Earlier this year, they were tracking a 15 foot long great white shark, est.at  2500 pounds, "very close to shore" for some time. That's the same beach area (S.E. USA coast)  I'm taking my 16 y/o son and his friends to later on today!

[benjio]

Have to be careful in most ocean areas. I know I shouldn't, but I take my boat out alone and thread my way in and around the barrier islands that are off our shoreline, fishing and crabbing. Plenty of bull sharks there. I like to take a dip in the sea usually 2 or 3 times during a day of fishing and recall one time when I noticed and unusual amount of hammerhead sharks, which scared the bejesus out of me. Some were over ten feet long. Not typically, but they are known to attack. I wear a blacked out watch--no silver or gold, but even w/o a cut, I bet sharks can sense and smell me under water. Earlier this year, they were tracking a 15 foot long great white shark, est.at  2500 pounds, "very close to shore" for some time. That's the same beach area (S.E. USA coast)  I'm taking my 16 y/o son and his friends to later on today!

I've done a couple of free dives in Porto de Galinhas to catch lobster and the worse I've ever run across in the water are a couple of nurse sharks on the reef bed. I would probably get out of the water for the rest of the day if I ever saw a bull shark on patrol. For some reason they stick mostly to the Recife and Boa Viagem areas. Even in Cabo de Santo Agostinho, just a few miles from Recife, shark attacks are extremely rare. Great Whites are scary animals because of their size and the sight of their teeth, but there's plenty of research that supports the belief that they usually don't target humans unless they confuse us with an animal they normally eat. Bull Sharks don't give a [snip]. It's in their nature to be aggressive and vicious. The sight of that girl's leg on the news gave me the impression that she was repeatedly attacked, and when the shark bit her it was lashing in an attempt to rip away flesh....even though I'm sure the girl was fighting to some extent. I've read that a lot of times when Great Whites bite, they will release when a person starts fighting because they realize they're not what they normally eat. Of course, if you're profusely bleeding in the water, you're pretty much a goner with any kind of shark. Women here in Recife for example, absolutely refuse to go in the water during their time of the month.

[robert angel]

  Great Whites are scary animals because of their size and the sight of their teeth, but there's plenty of research that supports the belief that they usually don't target humans unless they confuse us with an animal they normally eat.
 .

True, outside of man, the Great Whites are probably the top of the ocean predator food chain and are more intelligent than most sharks. they remember places too--that's one reason why we track them. I'd say the typical G.W. to human attack is on a person hand paddling back on a surfboard, basically a long, oval form with arms and legs dangling--looks a lot like a good sized 'seal meal'
 
In the Philippines and certainly other places, the box jelly fish is more of a worry than sharks. A good sized one can kill a human in two to five minutes. Death reports on such in the widely diverse, 7000 island Philippine nation are usually under reported, but about 50 deaths are reported each year. Even more deadly is the beautiful cone snail. Pick one of those up, put it in your pocket  and in about a minute you'll be in so much pain, you'll beg them to cut your leg off as you lay there dying.
 
Paradoxically, the cone snails, scorpions and venomous snakes, through research, are showing huge promise in curative medicines for every thing from paralysis to heart disease. Nature has spent millions of years, refining these venoms for task specific usage. Some drugs from these venoms are already patented and in use.
 
Between what's in the rain forests and oceans, our pollution and destruction is eliminating the very things that could possibly save us. Interesting how the guy who's now a billionaire from the Red Bull line of energy drinks got all the info on what the best ingredients to use are from Indians in the rain forest....

[V_Man]

When someone gets attacked by a shark it is international news. So we get the wrong impression. You have more chance of being hit by lightening. On the other hand jellyfish scare the crap out of me. I wont even touch one washed up on the beach. We get box jellyfish here as well. I once surfaced from a dive right into a swarm of jellyfish. Talk about accelerated heart rate!!! Fortunately they were harmless.
However I have been stung by a single jellyfish when I was a child- I was still in pain 3 months later!!!! It took a couple of years for the scars on my legs to heal. And that is not a deadly species of which there are many.  I've swum with many sharks over the years. IMHO give me a shark in the water any day, rather than a jellyfish.
That said, you'd be an idiot to hang around a Bull shark longer than you needed to.