A shark attack is an attack on a human by a shark. Every year around 60 shark attacks are reported worldwide, although death is quite unusual. Despite the relative rarity of shark attacks, the fear of sharks is a common phenomenon, having been fueled by the occasional instances of serial attacks, such as the Jersey Shore shark attacks of 1916, and by horror fiction and films, such as the Jaws series. Almost all shark experts feel that the danger presented by sharks has been exaggerated, and even the creator of the Jaws phenomenon, the latePeter Benchley, attempted to dispel the myth of sharks being man-eating monsters in the years before his death.
The great white shark is one of only four kinds of sharks that have been involved in a significant number of fatal unprovoked attacks on humans
In 2000, the year with the most recorded shark attacks, there were 79 shark attacks reported worldwide, 11 of them fatal.[1] In 2005 and 2006 this number decreased to 61 and 62 respectively, while the number of fatalities dropped to only four per year.[1] Of these attacks, the majority occurred in the United States (53 in 2000, 40 in 2005, and 39 in 2006).[2] The New York Times reported in July 2008 that there had been only one fatal attack in the previous year.[3] On average, there are 16 shark attacks per year in the United States with one fatality every two years.[4] Despite these reports, however, the actual number of fatal shark attacks worldwide remains uncertain. For the majority of Third World coastal nations, there exists no method of reporting suspected shark attacks; therefore, losses and fatalities at near-shore or sea there often remain unsolved or unpublicized.[citation needed][5]
The United States has had more reported shark attacks than any other country, with a total of 1,049 attacks (49 fatal) during the past 339 years (1670–2009).[6] According to the International Shark Attack File, the states in the U.S. where the most attacks have occurred in areFlorida, Hawaii, California, Texas, and the Carolinas, though attacks have occurred in almost every coastal state.[6] Outside the U.S.,Australia (since records started in 1791, 875 attacks of which 214 were fatal) [7] and South Africa have had the most attacks.[8]
As of 2010, the ISAF recorded a total of 2,320 unprovoked shark attacks worldwide since 1580, with 447 attacks being fatal.[8] The location with the most recorded shark attacks is New Smyrna Beach, Florida.[9] First world nations such as the United States, Australia, both high income countries, and to some extent South Africa, an upper middle income country, facilitate more thorough documentation of shark attacks on humans than poorer coastal countries.
The Florida Museum of Natural History compares these statistics with the much higher rate of deaths from other, less feared causes. For example, an average of more than 38 people die annually from lightning strikes in coastal states, while less than 1 person per year is killed by a shark.[10][11] In comparison, 100 million sharks are killed every year by humans.[12][13][14]
Even considering only people who go to beaches, a person's chance of getting attacked by a shark is 1 in 11.5 million, and a person's chance of getting killed by a shark is less than 1 in 264.1 million.[15][16] In the United States, the annual number of people who drown is 3,306, whereas the annual number of shark fatalities is 1.[
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