Q: How likely are you to get attacked by a shark?
A: Chances are slim – very, very slim – according to John McEachran, a professor of wildlife and fishery sciences at Texas A&M University who has spent years studying the creatures.
To get an idea of just how unlikely a shark attack is, let’s go to the stats. Each year, about 1 million people are killed in auto accidents around the world. About 90 die from peanut allergies. And while shark attack deaths doubled between 2002 and 2004, the number of worldwide deaths only went from three up to seven, according to the International Shark Attack File.
“There are millions of people in the water at any given moment of the day,” said McEachran in a university press release. “When you consider all of the people in the water at the same time, the number of shark attacks is very, very remote. Your chances of winning the lottery are greater than being attacked by a shark. But when a shark attack does occur, it makes big headlines … an auto accident that kills several people will not make big headlines across the U.S., but a shark attack on one person will.”
Most injury-causing shark attacks in the United States happen in Florida, with about 30 per year. California is a distant second on the list with an average of six, but even when sharks do attack, it’s usually accidental, said McEachran.
“Humans are not a shark’s preferred food choice,” he said. “They don’t regard the human shape as a prey item. Sometimes you hear reports of surfers having their boards hit by a shark, and it’s probably because the board resembles the shape of a seal, which is a prime food source for sharks.”
Most attacks occur in murky, shallow waters – an average of three to four feet in depth, but most also occur several hundred feet from the beach, said McEachran.
To better your chances of staying safe in the water, McEachran suggested sticking to well-populated beaches with lifeguards because sharks generally avoid crowded beach areas, and lifeguards are trained to look for sharks in the water.
– By Melania Zaharopoulos
