Recently, an American tourist died in a tragic shark attack off the coast of Costa Rica. A fatal accident that occurs extremely rarely.
The Costa Rican newspaper La Nación reports that the 49-year-old woman was attacked by a tiger shark while diving off Cocos Island. The forested volcanic island is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site. Her 26-year-old dive leader also suffered injuries.
For 30 years, tiger sharks had disappeared from the waters around the island, but in 2012 they returned, as La Nación reported at the time.
Sharks rarely attack humans
Even if the accident certainly evokes associations with *Jaws* for some: sharks do not normally attack humans and avoid them wherever possible. Unprovoked attacks are extremely unusual. If the animal really had not been provoked in this case, it would be the fifth confirmed attack in Costa Rica since 1580. These data come from the International Shark Attack File, an international database of shark attacks, maintained by the Florida Museum of Natural History.
“Sharks are not a threat, and it is essential to change our behaviour and our perception of sharks as a symbol of terror,” says a group of Costa Rican biologists in a statement following the attack.
The actual danger is vanishingly small
The situation is similar in other parts of the world: the risk of being injured or killed by a shark is vanishingly small. It is 75 times more likely to be killed by lightning than by sharks, and seawater is 132 times more dangerous (due to drowning) than the sharks swimming in it.
In addition, a potential increase in the number of shark attacks is usually due to human behaviour.
“The world population continues to grow rapidly, and its interest in recreational activities in marine regions is increasing. We should expect the number of shark attacks and other accidents in these regions to rise,” explains the International Shark Attack File in its report on shark attacks in 2016.
Sharks have more reason to fear
In fact, sharks have more reason to fear humans than the other way around. Researchers estimated in 2013 that around 100 million sharks are killed worldwide each year. This corresponds to an annual mortality rate of 6.4 to 7.9 percent, which biologists consider unsustainable.
“The number of sharks caught fluctuates from year to year, and given the biology of the species, the number is far too high,” says Boris Worm, a biologist at Dalhousie University and currently the lead scientist of the study.
