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German woman dies after arm was bitten off by shark while snorkeling in Hawaii

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xbhaskarx

Member
Oh man I love snorkeling in Hawaii, I was snorkeling in Maui (mostly in Honolua Bay) just a few months ago.


I've been following shark attacks in Hawaii for awhile (I snorkel there a lot) and almost every incident has similar factors:

- poor visibility
- choppy water conditions
- at dawn or dusk
- alone or only a few people
- day after storm or rain

These are prime shark hunting conditions because they have the advantage in bad visibility. The snorkel shops tell you to stay out during these situations, but tourists often ignore the warnings. Unfortunately this girl went out when it was poor visibility and the waters were choppy in the late afternoon - extremely dangerous conditions.

Thanks, I will remember this...

I believe this happened near the Molokini Crater, are there more sharks in that area?
 

Mononoke

Banned
Crazy. I go to Hawaii every summer, as we have a place on Maui. This year decided to try out the Caribbean instead. I usually go Snorkeling, so this is crazy. But others have pointed out, this isn't very common and there seems to be consistent factors in these incidents.
 

mrhGB

Banned
I'd never dream of getting in the water if sharks were known to be in the area. It must be one of the worst ways to die.
 
Those creatures aren't there to mess around. :(

well, they need to eat.

pretty much. Loudly (to them) splashing surface creature with warm blood.

They need to come up with some kind of electrical pulse emitter that will repel sharks, and not send them into a killing frenzy. OR underwater drones patrolling for sharks.

when you're in the sea, you're food.

the fact that there are ANY survivors of shark attacks tells you that
survivors merely experienced a "feel bite" (AKA wtf is that thing lemme check)

offcourse a "feel" bite still causes massive damage
after the feel bite the shark goes "eek wtf" and GTFO

humans are all bone no meat

and apparently we don't taste all that great.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say a trip to America is not safe at the moment, not to mention it costs an arm and leg.

I see what you did there.....
 

DonMigs85

Member
I remember a show on Animal Planet where a tiger shark was stalking a sea turtle, then the turtle suddenly turned around and bit the shark's gill slit, tearing it wide open.
 

MikeDown

Banned
I've been following shark attacks in Hawaii for awhile (I snorkel there a lot) and almost every incident has similar factors:

- poor visibility
- choppy water conditions
- at dawn or dusk
- alone or only a few people
- day after storm or rain

These are prime shark hunting conditions because they have the advantage in bad visibility. The snorkel shops tell you to stay out during these situations, but tourists often ignore the warnings. Unfortunately this girl went out when it was poor visibility and the waters were choppy in the late afternoon - extremely dangerous conditions.

Will try to remember
 
I've been following shark attacks in Hawaii for awhile (I snorkel there a lot) and almost every incident has similar factors:

- poor visibility
- choppy water conditions
- at dawn or dusk
- alone or only a few people
- day after storm or rain

These are prime shark hunting conditions because they have the advantage in bad visibility. The snorkel shops tell you to stay out during these situations, but tourists often ignore the warnings. Unfortunately this girl went out when it was poor visibility and the waters were choppy in the late afternoon - extremely dangerous conditions.

Yeah looking at this site you see that quite a few attacks happened in "turbid" waters. Anyone that knows Hawaii knows that the water is more often clear than not, so the relative (weighted) infrequency of attacks in clear water should help alleviate some fear. I think in calm, clear water with good visibility and no provocation 99.999% of the time a shark would leave you alone.
 

Friggz

Member
I went to turks and caicos last year and rented a boat whiel down there. The boat had 2 tiers and the top tier had a diving board going over the side. i was the first one to jump off and pencil dived onto a shark. that was probably 6-8 feet under water.
 

matt360

Member
What about Bull sharks? Aren't those worse?

I believe New Smyrna Beach, just south of Daytona Beach, is still the sharkbite capital of the world. But like the previous guy who said he was more scared of 'cudas said, nobody dies from those attacks. I actually have three surfer friends from Daytona (my hometown) who have been bitten and all they required were some stitches on their ankles/calves.

I've heard bull sharks are pretty nasty, but I don't think we get anything big enough in Central Florida that will kill you. Not saying it can't happen, just that it hasn't.
 

mm04

Member
That's scary stuff. My family and I went snorkeling near Molokini crater last month and there were a ton of boats and people in the water mid-morning. That probably is a discouraging factor.
 

mre

Golden Domers are chickenshit!!
This is why I stay on land, no flying sharks.

x6VBtuN.jpg
 

Baraka in the White House

2-Terms of Kombat
Yeah looking at this site you see that quite a few attacks happened in "turbid" waters. Anyone that knows Hawaii knows that the water is more often clear than not, so the relative (weighted) infrequency of attacks in clear water should help alleviate some fear. I think in calm, clear water with good visibility and no provocation 99.999% of the time a shark would leave you alone.

Makes sense. Seen plenty of videos of (crazy) people swimming with two or three sharks just chilling around them. In clear enough water most sharks don't seem to give a shit.
 

SiteSeer

Member
Yeah looking at this site you see that quite a few attacks happened in "turbid" waters. Anyone that knows Hawaii knows that the water is more often clear than not, so the relative (weighted) infrequency of attacks in clear water should help alleviate some fear. I think in calm, clear water with good visibility and no provocation 99.999% of the time a shark would leave you alone.

i had a close encounter with a shark in 2002 while snorkeling in hawaiian waters. i was about four feet down and below me another five feet was a shark probably 5 or six foot just resting there amongst the rocks and vegetation on the sea floor. was a cool experience. was clear water at noon snorkeling with a tour group.
 

TAJ

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
Those blue camo wetsuits seem like a really dumb idea.
Unless sharks have some sort of super-HDR vision, anything between them and the surface is going to be silhouetted dark against the sky during the day. And anything is going to look dark, period, at other times.
 
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