MissMTS

I don't know if any of you guys heard about the shark attack in san diego that happened on Friday. A man got killed by a Great White Shark in the ocean right off of a beach near where I live. He was training for a triathalon and was swimming with a group of people 150 yards out. They were swimming over the kelp beds when his friend heard him yell "Shark!" The poor man was thrown in the air after he was bitten and bled to death before he got to shore. It was really tragic and such a suprise since great whites are not native to San Diego. I guess they found a baby great white in a lagoon down here about a week ago, so I guess a family came down here to breed. They closed all of the beaches and issued warnings for people to stay out of the water, but some people are ignoring the warnings saying that the chances of it happening again are slim to none. Still, I won't be going in the water for a while. That is one fish that I do not want to get to close to.......

susitna-flower

Some animals just aren't cute and cuddly. I feel the same way about bears. We live with them in our back yard, and I can tell you they aren't cute and cuddly either!

We have already had a jogger mauled this spring her in AK.

COBettaCouple

A terrible thing to happen. Every now and then we'd have 1 back home in FL. Maybe over-fishing and ocean pollution are driving sharks to new waters.

SereneReyn

my husband has sort of a phobia of sharks... we live in the pacific northwest, near the puget sound... not exactly great white habitat, and i tried telling him that what he SHOULD be worried about is getting stung by jellies, but he still won't go in the water. erm, well i guess i should've used a different argument if that was my goal, but still...

this summer when we're all (extended family) skiing/kneeboarding, etc... he gets to watch from the boat i guess.

MissMTS

That is terrible. I had a friend that was attacked by a grizley bear while hiking in Wyoming. It was awful. She's a lucky girl to be alive.

MissMTS

Hmmm, maybe you're right. I never thought of that. Its scary anyways. Though, my dad told me the other day that a person is 30 more times likely to get struck by lightning than killed by a shark........something to think about.

MissMTS

Woooohoooo! My 1,000th post! an aman

Okay now that I got that out of my system.......My husband is soooo afraid of water. Right after it happened he looked at me and said "That's why you have to respect nature! People are not supposed to go in water. It is dangerous to us because it is not our element!" I laughed at him and told him that in the ocean that may be true, but that doesn't explain why he won't go in a pool.......it's not like there are sharks swimming around in there...lol!

COBettaCouple

If there were, I'd hire a pool service to clean it.

sirdarksol

Ocean waters are changing, not only in pollution, but in food quantity and in currents, and I'm sure these things are moving the larger predators like great whites around.
It's horrible that this woman died. Thankfully, this kind of thing shouldn't be common, since people aren't actually on most sharks' diet. We're too low in fat content to be worth hunting. The problem is that the only way sharks have of finding this out is by tasting us, an act that, with larger sharks, tends to leave us in serious danger.

I've got to say that I agree with the folks who are getting into the water. Chances are that the shark in question has now learned to identify people as inedible and will leave them alone as long as nobody tries to play with it or something really stupid. They're really smart animals. If it was a "man-eater", it's unlikely that it would have let go of the woman.
Of course, everyone should be careful while in the area, but there's never a time when a person's in the ocean that he/she shouldn't be careful. There are too many dangerous things (the most dangerous of which, it turns out, are about the size of your pinky and nearly impossible to see. Referring to the tiny box jellyfish) to not be aware of your surroundings while you're out there.