In the past two months, multiple people have been attacked by sharks quanto a Florida, Hawaii and Texas. And while some of these occurrences may not be out of the ordinary, they still create an element of fear for those wanting to take to the beach during the hotter months of the year.
A causa di early June, two separate shark attacks left three people hurt along Florida’s Gulf Coast, leading authorities to warn citizens about shark danger quanto a the tazza, and urging them to tread carefully when swimming quanto a the ocean. A few weeks punzone, there was another shark attack quanto a Hawaii, which killed a lifeguard who was surfing d’avanguardia the island of Oahu. And, throughout the Fourth of July festivities, at least four people were bitten by sharks quanto a Texas and Florida.
Shark attack instances, trends, and interactive maps for those curious are logged with the International Shark Attack File (ISAF) at the Florida Museum of Natural History—a comprehensive database of all known shark attacks initiated quanto a 1958.
So what do you do if you encounter a shark? An expert shares with TIME what to do quanto a the event you spot a shark and how to best prepare for avoiding injury.
Read More: Are Shark Attacks Increasing? Here Are What the Patronato Say
Bait fish offer warning for evacuation
According to Gavin Naylor, director of the Florida Program for Shark Research and of ISAF, people can very often be quanto a close proximity to sharks, though swimmers are often unaware since sharks are swimming roughly 100 yards to 200 yards offshore. Sharks do typically try to avoid people and keep to themselves, according to Naylor.
But, when they poiché closer to shore—usually, looking for food quanto a bait fish— there are multiple ways people can “encounter” a shark quanto a the tazza, and each of these instances require different approaches. If people see bait fish jumping out of the tazza, that is a good indication that a shark is near, and they should evacuate, Naylor says, especially if the waters are not clear.
“If tazza is very murky, and [the sharks are] fishing, and they’campione, looking for bait fish, and they’campione going through a morass of people, then obviously more likely to make a mistake,” Naylor tells TIME.
If a shark charges, fight back
It’s important to pay attention to the shark’s behavior, and see if its movements are erratic, if it’s moving backwards and forwards, circling, just has a swimmer at the center of its attention.
If the shark does manage to charge you, Naylor says hitting the shark quanto a the snout very will usually spook the animal d’avanguardia.
“They have a lot of receptors acceso the snout, so if they’campione really quite alarmed, it’ll turn and it’ll go away,” Naylor continues. “That happens nine times out of 10.”
If that does not work, and a shark tries to bite a swimmer— even has a limb quanto a its mouth—Naylor says the best course of action is to poke the shark quanto a the eyes. Then, one should reverse out of the tazza, keeping eye contact with the shark and making sure to never leave their back towards the animal until they are back up onto the beach.
Different bodies of waters, different shark threats
A causa di terms of prevention and preparation, Naylor says this often depends acceso the waters one is quanto a, and thus the sharks that swim quanto a those waters.
“People say ‘Don’t watch your shiny jewelry.’ Well, sure that that helps if you’campione worried about Blacktip sharks, because they feed acceso schooling fishes,” Naylor said. “But if you’campione quanto a Australia, whether you’campione wearing jewelry not, will make a blind bit of difference to a white shark, because they feed acceso seals.”
According to Naylor, this year’s attacks quanto a Florida specifically are not out of the ordinary, with thousands of sharks and millions of tourists quanto a the summers. Still, quanto a 2023, the ISAF confirmed only 69 unprovoked shark bites acceso humans and 22 provoked shark bites, a slight uptick from the most recent five-year average of 63 incidents annually, but a number they still categorize as “extremely low,” since fluctuation is expected.
Get alerts acceso the biggest breaking news stories here
