What percentage of people who you see on the beach go swimming in the ocean? Rather a simple question, no? Think about it and select a number.
It’s a query I pose now and again to friends and family — typically while lounging in a beach chair, watching others doing the same nearby, the ocean itself untouched by human activity.
My guess is five percent — those that enter the water beyond their knees. I’ve heard estimates as high as 25 percent, which I consider wildly unlikely.
It’s a pertinent thing to consider. Many of us live in Vero to have regular access to the beach and ocean. Friends and family visit us for the same reason. Tourists too. Indeed, the beach and ocean for many of us are as much a part of home as our living room.
So again, please venture a guess.
What Explains the Prevalence?
Full disclosure, I’ve never measured this behavior with any degree of rigor; I just intuit the general incidence from a lifetime spent on beaches most everywhere, observing people sit, chat, lay prostrate, sleep, read, play games, walk, gather shells, dig, sculp sand, fish, drink and eat, tan, bake and sunburn — doing everything but wading in.
I happen to be one of those who love to swim in the ocean, every chance I get, almost regardless of conditions. As children at the beach in summer, we’d spend the entire day in the surf, coming out only occasionally to snack. There is almost nothing better to me than standing neck-deep in the ocean, looking seaward at the horizon and big sky, or corking in the swells, or body surfing. It’s a special joy in life.
Yet why is it that so few people feel the same? What is their aversion? I acknowledge that there are many potential underlying reasons. And that many folks won’t reveal their deepest reservations fully, offering instead something about too warm or too cold or too lazy to go in: not right now, they say, but definitely later.
I think it boils down to two deep-seated and interrelated fears. First, the inability to see their feet clearly — or at all — when standing, thus not knowing what creatures could be lurking. And second, that some of those creatures hanging about could be sharks. Period, full stop, sharks. To be sure, they could step on something creepy. But it’s the thought of sharks that freaks people out — since, they are certain, one is planning to maim or kill them at any moment!
Special callout once again to author Peter Benchley and Jaws for messing with people’s minds, irrevocably. (Released June of 1975. I saw it in a theater on a rainy day with my sister in Ocean City, MD.)
Truth be told, however, expectations for a close-up shark encounter is a completely irrational fear. It might, of course, be a real, clutching, fully debilitating feeling for the individual, but it’s nevertheless misplaced. And why would this be so? Because statistics bear it out.
Florida Shark Danger in Perspective
Present-day sharks and their ancestors have traversed Florida waters for over 400 million years. They are apex predators whose presence is essential to keeping marine ecosystems in balance. Simply put, healthy Florida reefs and fish populations require healthy shark numbers — it’s not possible without them. Indeed, the abundance of sharks in Florida is simply another dimension of the amazing and varied environment in which we are blessed to live.
Sharks migrate in an out of Florida waters to feed and re-produce. They inhabit both deep and nearshore waters and bays depending on the influence of water temperature and the presence of prey. Favorite baitfish include mullet, sardines, and menhaden; some eat marine invertebrates and plankton. Easy and ample food sources and healthy protective reefs provide ideal conditions for birthing and raising pups.
Florida sharks tend to move inshore and north in the spring and summer, and offshore and south in cooler months. Accordingly, shark activity spikes in Florida from April through October, just when locals and vacationers alike are most likely to hit the beach. The greater presence of people swimming, not higher numbers of sharks, increases the probability of interaction.
Still, death from shark bite in Florida occurs less than one percent of the time following an incident. Underlying this, it is highly unlikely to be bitten or even see a shark. From 2012 to 2021, there were 259 recorded shark bites in Florida — none were fatal. Whereas the annual risk of death during one’s lifetime from heart disease is 1 in 5, cancer 1 in 7, car accidents 1 in 84, falls 1 in 218, air accidents 1 in 5,051, and lightening 1 in 79,746, the odds of death by shark is 1 in 4,332,817. Globally, is estimated that 70-100 shark bites occur annually, resulting in roughly five deaths. In sum, in Florida, humans are 30 times more likely to be struck by lightning than bitten by a shark.
(Point of interest: from 1837 to present, reported and confirmed unprovoked shark bites by state stand as follows for the top five: Florida 912, Hawaii 187, California 136, South Carolina 115, and North Carolina 78. So it’s Florida #1 by a wide margin.)
Cases of Mistaken Identity
Experts attribute the vast majority of shark bites to error on the shark’s part. In other words, humans aren’t specifically targeted as a food source, but end up an appetizer by mistake.
For starters, most attacks occur in nearshore, i.e., shallower, waters, where sharks go to feed. There may be one or more sandbars parallel to the shoreline with bait inside or between them, providing a perfect locale for sharks to feed on concentrated, channeled fish. Equally productive are steep drop-offs further seaward where fish often aggregate in current.
In this environment — read right off your beach — the most common observed mode of attack is “hit and run.” Here the shark mingles with swimmers, believes a swimmer may be baitfish — particularly in less than clear water — and strikes, inflicting a single bite or slash wound, never to return. Add to this the confusion of breaking waves and current.
Conversely, the victim doesn’t see the shark. By instinct, the shark is making quick decisions and rapid movements to capture prey, not exactly checking out each morsel of food.
Following the bite, experts believe the shark quickly realizes that the swimmer is an unfamiliar object, or too large to deal with, and immediately releases and retreats. Resulting injuries are typically below the knee and not life-threatening.
Because the biting shark is seldom seen, good data do not exist on which species are most commonly involved. That said, top suspects include blacktip (Carcharhinus limbatus), spinner (Carcharhinus brevipinna) and blacknose (Carcharhinus acronotus) sharks.
Prudent Precautions to Take
In truth, shark attack is a potential accident that must be honestly acknowledged by anyone who enters the ocean. Part A in dealing with this is to keep the risk in proper perspective — it’s a rare occurrence. Part B is to minimize this risk by doing a few smart things that are known to be effective:
•Avoid being in the water during twilight or in darkness when sharks are most active
•Refrain from excess splashing and causing a commotion
•Remove shiny objects — a watch, jewelry — which may reflect light mimicking the sheen of fish scales •Be careful in murky water, avoid wearing bright clothing as sharks see contrast particularly well
•Do not enter the water with a bleeding wound or when menstruating
•If you see a shark close by, leave the water
Most importantly, to my mind:
•Do not swim too far offshore, especially in depths where there is a considerable gap between your feet and the bottom
•Use extra caution when swimming in sandbars, and where the bottom drops off steeply
Notably, in many areas along the Treasure Coast, single or multiple limestone reefs run parallel to the shoreline, oftentimes not further than 100 yards out. These areas feature soft corals, sea fans, sponges, as well as sea turtles and many species of common reef fish. Of course, where there are fish, there will be sharks. Unfortunately, some time ago our nearshore reefs were labeled “Shark Alley,” and the name stuck. Occasionally you’ll hear somebody refer to this label, inferring a greater risk of shark attack off Vero Beach. It isn’t so.
Two shark attacks in recent memory are worth recounting for what they teach. In May 2012, Karen Stei, a vacationer from Germany, lost her leg when swimming near Humiston Beach. Her mistake was to venture into deep water. A second incident involved a “hit and run” in front of the Costa d’Este Hotel, in calm, relatively clear water on a Sunday afternoon, imparting puncture wounds to a woman’s thigh. She stated no plans to stop swimming in the ocean.
How I Approach It
Having read this far, my own mindset won’t be a surprise, since it pretty much tracks with the key points of learning above: shark attacks are rare, deadly injury is even rarer. That sums it up.
Arriving at a beach to swim, I will always stop to get a sense of what’s going on. I’ll look at the sky and scan for storms and rain. I’ll feel for wind, judging its speed and direction, and how it’s affecting the water in terms of wave height and wave frequency. The color of the water reveals its turbidity or clarity. I’ll look for baitfish, for seaweed, for anything moving in the water or floating in it. I’ll look for birds working — gathered and diving and turning — indicating something is feeding on something else directly beneath them. Importantly, I’ll assess tide (low, high, mid) and if there’s current, its direction and strength. Rip currents are easily identified by a narrow channel of discolored water perpendicular to the shoreline. Finally, I want to know if I’m alone, or if there are swimmers in the water and/or people on the beach. While this might seem a lot to do, it takes only seconds.
Here are some scenarios. At the beach one day, I observed spinner sharks — literally dozens of them — leaping out of the water, gyrating, and splashing back in. The show was perhaps 300 yards out. I watched for a bit, judging them sufficiently distant, and then swam. Another time, having just left the water, while sitting on the sand, I spotted a single six-foot lemon shark working its way northward up the beach, in no more than two feet of water where sand and ocean meet. Every so often it would thrash its tails to maintain momentum, but otherwise it blended right in. I walked south for a ways and went in. And then there was the time my friend and I went to swim and found the ocean packed with baitfish, every inch of it, for as far as we could see. There were really nice six-to-eight-foot breaking waves. We went in. One wave went by, broke to the right of us, revealing sharks inside. We got out. In retrospect, we probably should have stayed dry. Standing in or treading water, I will constantly scan the surface for objects and surface movements. If the sun’s really bright, I’ll go in with cheap sunglasses.
So sharks are there, always. There is no dividing line between us and them. The ocean is their home, we visit only occasionally, and then only briefly.
Most things we do in life involve risk to varying degrees. Walking, driving, flying, climbing ladders, recreational sports, and so on. We know this and do these things anyway — without even thinking — because we believe the benefits gained outweigh the risks and dangers involved. No different with ocean swimming: If it’s your day, well then, it happens; if not, then enjoy yourself in a truly glorious place.
Consider this in closing: Should one ever be bitten, there’s an upside to being a shark-bite celebrity. Imagine all the cocktail parties and dinners where you no longer have to invent small talk — just break out your scars!
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