Remember that scene from Jaws two where Roy Scheider surveys the nearby beach from a shark tower? I suppose if I were swimming at a shark infested beach, having someone gazing over the water looking for long dark shadows would be a comfort. But more comfortable, I think, would if said beach had some kind of shark net or shark shield in place.I was curious about such things, and found this recent piece in National Geographic. They discuss an electronic beach defense system, the likes of which was used to safeguard triathletes competing in Sydney Harbor during the 2000 Olympics. (How embarrassing would that be if an Olympic swimmer got eaten by a shark during the Olympics?)
Anyway, this electronic-shield project is actually a reality, and is a joint effort of the Natal Sharks Board in South Africa and SeaChange Technology. The devices, they say, tap into the heightened sensitivity that sharks have to electrical fields, giving off electricity to keep sharks at bay...or out of the bay. Of course, some folks don't like the idea, and have called it "unacceptable," saying they would cause unnecessary harassment of sharks.
1. back in sept 2004, there was a female great white shark isolated in Nashon Harbor for almost two weeks. Greg Skomal, the lead shark researcher for the Mass Div of Marine Fisheries, had an electronic shark repeller flown in from South Africa to try and persuade this fish to leave town. It's a good thing that no Olympic triatheletes were around to witness its 'effectiveness' as they probably would have thought twice about entering the waters around Syndey for that swim. The device would have been more effective if they whacked the shark on the nose with it.
Posted at 3:56PM on Aug 1st 2005 by frank murphy