Who wants to cage dive with Great White sharks?

TOURISTS are paying more than $10,000 for a luxury cruise of South Australia, which includes diving with Great White sharks and dining on Coffin Bay oysters.

The inaugural tour, from North Star Cruises, leaves Outer Harbour tomorrow, visiting the Fleurieu Peninsula, Kangaroo Island and the Eyre Peninsula before arriving in Ceduna on January 25.
About 28 guests are expected on the 50m long cruise ship, True North, which has its own helicopter and carries six expedition vessels with about 18 crew members.

Guests are paying between $6995 and $10,495, for the cruise.

The trip from the luxury wilderness cruise company, based most of the year in the Kimberley, is believed to be the first of its type in SA. The company is so confident the SA tour will be a success, it has added the tour to its January itinerary each year.

Local tourism leaders have welcomed the seven-day/eight-night Southern Safari saying it combines luxury and nature experiences which are important for attracting high yield interstate and international tourists.

South Australian Tourism Commission chief executive Andrew McEvoy said "unspoilt wilderness and unique coastal experiences are two of South Australia's key strengths as a tourism destination, but many visitors don't want to have to rough it".

Drew Kluska, who runs Adelaide-based, prestige travel agency Outback Encounter, said it was "pretty unusual to get a boat like this into South Australia".

Highlights include wine tasting in McLaren Vale, a visit to Kangaroo Island, shark cage diving off the Gambier Islands and Coffin Bay oysters.

Cape Town, South Africa knows how to keep swimmers safe

Great white sharks are found throughout the world's oceans, prompting many beach communities to build special nets to protect swimmers and surfers. But authorities in Cape Town, South Africa, are trying a different approach. They have created a network of shark "spotters" who sound an alarm when danger lurks. The program tries to protect people and sharks. For VOA, Terry FitzPatrick reports.

"Great white sharks swim around the boat during a shark festival in Gansbaai, South Africa, 18 Aug 2007If you are swimming along Cape Town's ocean beach, this is a sound you do not want to hear.

This is just a test. But about 50 times a year this horn, and an even louder siren, signal an actual alarm. It means a great white shark is swimming toward shore.

Yvonne Kamp of the Cape Town shark spotter patrol says the warnings work.

"It really just takes a few minutes. That siren goes and everybody knows the drill. The shark spotters also walk up and down and whistle and wave hands, whatever it takes to get the last people out of the water," said Kamp.

The shark spotters are a team of 20 specially-trained lookouts. Their work begins not on the beach, but in the mountains high above shoreline.

"Muizenberg beach watch from Muizenberg mountain watch," said Tracey Provins, who peers at the ocean, using high-power binoculars.

"Visibility is about 10 percent. I've got about 20 surfers and 10 bathers, copy," said Provins.
Provins says a great white shark is hard to miss. They can grow up to six meters long.

"It's a dark shadow. Most of the time, they don't come up. If they come up, we'll just see the fin," added Provins.

Provins uses a walkie-talkie radio to warn the beaches below. She tracks everything in the water because wherever there is prey, predators follow.

Great white sharks are a particular problem in Cape Town. At least 250 of them come to feed at seal colony that lives on an island close to shore.

Alison Kock from the University of Cape Town has been using underwater radio beacons to study the sharks. The beacons look like thick grey pencils with fish hooks at the end.

"And what we have here is a acoustic monitor. And, what these do is they work with a transmitter, which we tag the sharks with," she said. "So when we get up close and personal with the sharks, we try to attach these transmitters to them. And, this transmitter sends out a unique code."

Kock's research reveals that sharks stay away from shore when there are newborn pups to eat at the seal colony. But at this time of year, sharks rove closer to the beach in search of other prey. She says great whites are not man-eaters by nature. But they are inquisitive.

"White sharks are particularly confident, curious animals. They're really interested in people," said Kock. "And for the most part they don't do anything. They swim by, they have a look, they swim by, and carry on swimming."

But with more than 100 teeth, even a curious nibble from a great white can maim or kill a person. Cape Town's shark spotter program began three years ago after a series of attacks. There were calls to cull the shark population. But great whites are an endangered species, and Kock says killing them would damage the marine ecosystem.

"Great white sharks are the top predator in our waters here in Cape Town. So this means that they have a lot of influence on all the species below them. They not only prey on seals, they prey on different shark species, fish populations, rays - all kinds of things," she continued.

Shark spotter Yvonne Kamp says safety nets were ruled out for Cape Town because sharks, dolphins, turtles and whales get tangled in them and die. She says her network of warning stations is a healthy compromise.

"When people's lives are threatened, everyone is really keen on keeping the people safe and not worrying about the sharks. What we're trying to do is find a balance, where we're keeping people safe, but we're also not harming the ocean," said Kamp.

Many surfers and swimmers support this approach.

"People should leave the water first before taking out any sharks. You know, it's their world and they should be left alone," said Joanne Merrett.

"I think the sharks have just as much right to be in the water as we have, and they are entitled to be there," added Stan Mitchell.

Kerry van Graan said "I think if they wanted to attack people there would be more attacks, because there are a lot out there. So, basically, you take your chances."

According to Shark Attack File, a group that tracks incidents worldwide, roughly 90 shark bites are reported each year. On average, six people are killed. But, in Cape Town, the spotters seem to be beating the odds. Since they began protecting ten popular beaches, they have not had a single shark attack.

Huge Great White shark spotted by surfers at Surf Beach, in Australia

A Massive gat white shark has sparked an air search off Phillip Island. The creature, believed to be bigger than 5m long, was spotted by surfers about 2.30pm. The shark was seen off Surf Beach.
Surfer Louise Parsons said she dashed from the water after seeing the animal, which is believed to have been seen around the area for the past six months. "I thought, ‘gee I'm drifting towards that rock quickly'. Then it turned on it's side and I thought, ‘oh my God!," she said. Ms Parsons paddled her board to shore before yelling at the other surfers to clear the water.

She said the shark - witnessed by 10 people at the beach - would have been almost twice as long as her three-metre surfboard. "If it wanted any of us, it would have taken us," Ms Parsons said. "I'd have said the length of it was longer than a station wagon."

Ms Parsons said she feared for her surfing friend Janine Pike as the creature turned away from her. "It swung on its side and headed straight for her but she couldn't hear me because there were waves breaking," she said.

Ms Parsons said she had surfed Phillip Island for 20 years but not seen a shark for about five years. Woolamai Beach Surf Lifesaving Club lifeguard Chris Stevens said a plane had been sent up to look for the shark but nothing was seen. "If it was there, we would have closed all the beaches in the area," Mr Stevens said. He said a big, old great white had been seen in the area for the past six months.

5m Great White shark spotted off Phillip Island in Australia

A MASSIVE great white shark has sparked an air search off Phillip Island. The creature, believed to be bigger than 5m long, was spotted by surfers about 2.30pm.

The shark was seen off Surf Beach. Surfer Louise Parsons said she dashed from the water after seeing the animal, which is believed to have been seen around the area for the past six months. "I thought, ‘gee I'm drifting towards that rock quickly'.

Then it turned on it's side and I thought, ‘oh my God!," she said. Ms Parsons paddled her board to shore before yelling at the other surfers to clear the water. She said the shark - witnessed by 10 people at the beach - would have been almost twice as long as her three-metre surfboard. "If it wanted any of us, it would have taken us," Ms Parsons said.

"I'd have said the length of it was longer than a station wagon." Ms Parsons said she feared for her surfing friend Janine Pike as the creature turned away from her. "It swung on its side and headed straight for her but she couldn't hear me because there were waves breaking," she said.

Ms Parsons said she had surfed Phillip Island for 20 years but not seen a shark for about five years. Woolamai Beach Surf Lifesaving Club lifeguard Chris Stevens said a plane had been sent up to look for the shark but nothing was seen. "If it was there, we would have closed all the beaches in the area," Mr Stevens said. He said a big, old great white had been seen in the area for the past six months.

Great White sharks in the cold waters of the North Sea?

Watch out! Jaws could be about - off the coast of eastern England.

The body of a seal mutilated with a huge bite mark has been washed up in Norfolk and experts say it could be the work of a great white shark.

Further down the coast, angler Mike Bakun, 53, found the head of a porpoise on a beach near Aldeburgh, Suffolk.

He said: "It was as if the back end had been chomped right off. Then the next day I saw on the news that a seal had been savaged off the Norfolk coast."

The latest alerts follow a series of claims last summer of sharks near Cornish beaches.
Great whites are normally found off Australia and South Africa but can survive waters as cold as the North Sea.

The man-eating shark, made famous by the Jaws films, can reach up to 4,500lbs. Dr Ken Collins, of the National Oceanography Centre in Southampton, said the bite on the first seal at Sheringham indicated a big shark.

He added: "Something with very sharp teeth has come in and hit it at speed and taken a single bite out of it.

"The chunk taken out suggests a large shark. There is no reason why there wouldn't be great whites off the coast. They live in waters with similar temperatures."

But the Shark Trust's Ali Hood said it was "extremely unlikely" to be Jaws.

Great White shark scared swimmers in Cape Town beach

Stingrays, a great white shark and broken sea shells conspired to ruin the day for bathers at Cape Town’s Muizenberg beach at the weekend.

On Saturday, two people were treated in hospital after they stepped on the serrated, venomous tails of blue stingrays — injuries that marine experts called unprecedented at Muizenberg.
The National Sea Rescue Institute said the two stingray victims were doing well and recovering at home.

“To our understanding, nothing like this has happened before at Surfers’ Corner,” spokesman Craig Lambinon said.

Yvonne Kamp, speaking on behalf of the Shark Spotters group, which posts lookouts on cliffs overlooking popular beaches, said she had never before heard of swimmers being injured by stingrays.

She said bathers at Muizenberg had a fresh scare yesterday when a great white shark cruised close to the surf line. Swimmers were warned to get out of the water.

Lambinon said six people cut the soles of their feet at Muizenberg on Saturday when they stepped on broken mussel shells.

He said a strong south-easter appeared to have blown a large number of mussels into the area.

4m Great White shark off the New Zealand Coast

The four-metre shark appeared as a shadow in the water as Te Horo builder Gary Porter prepared to take his third dive off the southern tip of Kapiti Island on Saturday afternoon.

Mr Porter and his three dive buddies watched in awe as the shark circled their 6.5-metre runabout for more than an hour, passing close enough for them to touch its fin and putting its nose within centimetres of the boat's propeller.

The run-in comes amid a series of shark sightings around New Zealand, including a five-metre shark spotted off north Taranaki on Friday, a 2.5-metre bronze whaler caught in a fishing net off Papamoa last Saturday, and a 2.5-metre mako seen daily for the past week at Northland's Ocean Beach.

Mr Porter said the boat's skipper, Marcello Giacon, spotted the shadow coming toward the boat.
"He goes, `Stop, stop - there's a shark coming,' just as we were about to jump overboard. And the next thing that shark is circling our boat."

The men abandoned their dive and Mr Porter began photographing the shark by dipping his hand beneath the surface and snapping about 50 shots on his waterproof digital camera.

His mates even dangled him upside down, dunking his head into the ocean, in a bid to get a better photo of the shark, before trying to feed it by trailing a dead fish on a line. But, perhaps fortunately for Mr Porter, it wasn't hungry.

Mr Porter, Mr Giacon, Chris Martin and Gordy Clarke scuba dive off Kapiti Island about twice a week, usually spearfishing moki and butterfish or gathering crayfish.By coincidence, Steven Spielberg's blockbuster Jaws, which demonised great whites, was on television on Saturday night. The men got home too late to watch it.

"We've all seen it before, but you sort of don't want to watch those sort of movies when you're trying to dive," Mr Porter said.

"... You've got to come up pretty slow, and this thing's cruising around.

"They're so fast. It's amazing for that size how quickly it can move through the water. You wouldn't stand a chance really."

Mr Giacon estimated the great white weighed between 400 and 500 kilograms. "I was just about to drop the boys off and there it was. There was a lot of yahooing when we were out there. It was exciting stuff.

"It's sort of bad news for us diving, but that's tough. We're diving where it lives."

National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research shark expert Malcolm Francis said the shark was definitely a great white and probably female. "They have a very distinctive smile. It's a very nice-looking shark."

It was about four metres long - "around the size when they make the transition from eating fish to feeding on warm blooded mammals like seals". That meant the shark could be dangerous to humans, though most great white attacks were believed to be cases of mistaken identity.

"They will spot something on the surface that looks like a seal, like a surfer or a swimmer," Dr Francis said.

Great White shark and friends cleared a beach

Terrified beachgoers in northern Australia fled the water when 12 sharks - including a 15ft Great White - were spotted close to the shore.

It is the same area where two weeks ago surfer Ben Morcom, 31, was bitten on the backside by a shark.

Hawks Nest Beach in New South Wales was closed for several hours till the all-clear was given.
Dad David Collins said: "We panicked because a minute earlier our boys had been splashing around."

A lifeguard said: "You do see more sharks at this time of year because they are chasing bait fish."