International Shark Attack File Report: Unprovoked shark bites plummeted in 2024

(Press-News.org) 2024 was an exceptionally calm year for shark bites. Worldwide, there were only 47 unprovoked attacks, down 22 from the previous year and well below the 10-year average of 70. Four of last year’s attacks resulted in fatalities, also a significant reduction from recent years.

The International Shark Attack File, maintained by the Florida Museum of Natural History, provides data on what are considered unprovoked bites, defined as incidents in which a person does not initiate contact with a shark. Instances in which a person intentionally or unintentionally initiates contact, including spearfishing and releasing sharks from nets or hooks, are not included in the report.

“We’re interested in the natural patterns of shark behavior so that we can understand why people occasionally get bitten by these animals. Any cue or attribute that modifies an animal’s natural behavior is something that, we as scientists, want to exclude,” said Gavin Naylor, director of the Florida Program for Shark Research.

The United States consistently has the highest number of unprovoked bites, a trend that continued last year with a total of 28 reported incidents. An attack by an unknown shark species off the northwest coast of Oahu, Hawaii resulted in the only unprovoked fatality in the U.S.

With warm waters and ample shoreline, Florida had a total of 14 bites, more than any other state. Of these, eight occurred in Volusia County, which bears the unofficial title of shark bite capital of the world. Though unconfirmed, many of these bites were likely from blacktip sharks, whose breeding grounds stretch along the northeast Florida coastline. Many of the sharks in this area are juveniles and haven’t yet fully developed the ability to distinguish between humans and their natural prey, which includes fish, stingrays and other sharks.

In June, a spate of attacks in the Florida Panhandle took place within four miles of each other, injuring three people. A trio of healthcare professionals — two nurses and one paramedic — were vacationing along Watersound Beach in South Walton, FL, where a woman bitten by a bull shark was carried ashore. They and other bystanders provided lifesaving medical attention while first responders were en route to the scene. Less than two hours later, a shark bit two teenagers wading in the shallows of nearby Seacrest Beach.

Bull sharks and tiger sharks are common along Florida’s northern coast, but they rarely venture into recreational areas.

“You’ll see 20 to 30 of them patrolling the coast about 500 feet offshore, where they mind their own business,” Naylor said. Nearby dune lakes that regularly dump freshwater into the sea were reportedly blocked when the attacks occurred. This may have allowed schools of fish, which are invariably followed by sharks, to swim closer to shore than they otherwise would have.

As residents and tourists converge on the coastlines for summer holidays, the likelihood of a shark encounter increases. This was evident over the July 4 weekend when six people were injured by sharks in Texas and Florida. Five of these qualify as unprovoked bites.

“The South Padre Island bites were significant, with several incidents on the same day in the same vicinity,” said International Shark Attack File manager Joe Miguez. 

Padre Island, a thin sliver of sand dunes, tidal flats and coastal prairie that begins near the U.S. Mexico border and curves north to Corpus Christi, is the largest barrier island in the world, and its southern terminus is a major tourist attraction. A woman swimming in murky water near one of the island’s sandbars was bitten on her calf, and her husband sustained mild injuries while fending off the shark. Another man was bitten nearby, and a teenager received a small wound when a shark ran into her and grazed her leg, either with its teeth or its rough skin (shark skin is composed of small, flattened teeth called denticles).

Initial reports of the Padre Island attacks speculated that a single shark may have been responsible for the attacks, and the same idea was used to explain the consecutive attacks that took place a month earlier in the Florida panhandle. While it’s possible for a single shark to bite multiple people in an area, there’s little evidence to suggest this actually takes place.

“We can’t preclude that it was the same animal, but what’s often overlooked is that the same climatic conditions that bring people into the water are the same conditions that bring sharks closer to shore,” Naylor said, meaning if there’s one shark nearby, there are likely others as well.

“This naturally increases the likelihood of human-shark encounters,” Miguez said. “In the case of the Padre Island incidents, it is much more plausible that multiple sharks were present in the area, responding to the same environmental cues.”

There were three unprovoked attacks in California, including one in which a surfboard was punctured. Globally, surfers accounted for 33% of all attacks last year.

“People surf where there are good waves, and where there are good waves, there’s turbidity, and where there’s turbidity, there are often bait fish that attract sharks. The turbidity also reduces visibility in the water, making it harder for sharks to see. Some of them make mistakes,” Naylor said.

The three remaining shark bites in the U.S. occurred in North and South Carolina.

Australia typically averages the second-highest number of reported bites and fatalities. Of the 13 shark species that have been known to bite humans, all of them have distributions in Australia’s waters. White sharks and bull sharks are particularly common. White sharks form two overlapping populations along the southwest and southeast spurs of the continent, each with a few hundred adults, down significantly from their estimated historical size.

Even relatively minor bites from a white or a bull shark can be life-threatening, contributing to the country’s high fatality rate. This number oscillates from year to year, however, and in 2019, 2022 and 2024, there were no reported fatalities from unprovoked encounters.

Ten other countries all had single bites, including one in the Red Sea off Egypt’s coast in which a man reportedly swimming outside a designated safety area was killed. Other countries include Belize, Trinidad and Tobago, The Bahamas, the Maldives, Mozambique, French Polynesia, Thailand and the Turks and Caicos.

An unusual incident off the coast of Western Sahara marked the first reported shark attack for the region. A German tourist sailing on a British catamaran traveling from the Canary Islands was attacked while swimming alongside the boat. The incident occurred in remote international waters, and it took several hours for an emergency crew to reach the scene by helicopter. The woman died from her injuries on the return trip.

A man wading through waters of the Vaitarna River in western India was bitten last year by a medium-sized bull shark. Of the species that could be identified from witness accounts, video footage of the attacks and/or the pattern of lacerations left by their teeth, bull sharks were the main culprit of last year’s bites. Unlike most other shark species, bull sharks are tolerant of freshwater environments and have been found in rivers hundreds of miles from the sea. Pregnant females often navigate upstream, where there are fewer predators that pose a danger to their young.

The chances of being bitten by a shark remain incredibly low. According to the World Health Organization, drowning is the third leading cause of accidental death worldwide, and coastal features like rip tides and strong currents pose a greater risk to beachgoers than sharks.

The International Shark Attack File provides a curated list of recommendations for further reducing your risk of a shark bite, such as removing reflective jewelry before entering the water and avoiding areas where people are fishing. For more resources, including the full 2022 report (available 9 a.m., ET, Feb. 6), you can visit the International Shark Attack File’s website.  The full infographic with summary statistics and safety tips is also available for download. An individual global bite map, and graph of 20-year bite and fatality numbers and visualization of bites by U.S. state are also available. 

Shark jaw photograph.

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