Don't know if anyone has heard about this.

[Carol47]

From BBC website.

Shark attacks three tourists in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt

Three tourists have been injured by a shark in three separate attacks at the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.

Virtually all water sports have been suspended at the Red Sea resort following the attacks.

One of the tourists is believed to be in a critical conditional in hospital in the Egyptian capital, Cairo.

The authorities are searching for an oceanic white tip shark, which is believed to have carried out the attacks.

They want to capture the shark and release it into the open sea.

The Associated Press news agency quoted a local conservation official, Mohammed Salem, as saying all the victims were Russian.

The suspension of diving and water sports applies to all but a small area around Sharm el-Sheikh.

Attacks by oceanic white tip sharks are extremely rare and shark attacks of any kind are very unusual in the Red Sea.

The BBC Cairo correspondent, Jon Leyne, says it is one of the most popular areas in the world for diving, so a decision to suspend water sports there would not have been taken lightly.

[Netyoda]

More info:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/de ... rk-attacks

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010 ... ion=justin

It should be noted that this is an oceanic white tip, quite rare here, and not the common and much smaller white tip reef shark

http://en.rian.ru/world/20101202/161593099.html

[Andy]

Reported on Sky news that a German tourist has been killed today.

[DJKeefy]

Egypt killed wrong sharks after diver attacks:NGO

CAIRO (Reuters) - Conservation workers in Egypt caught and killed the wrong sharks after attacks on four foreign divers at a Red Sea resort, and the shark responsible for the attacks is still at large, a marine NGO said.

The Hurghada Environmental Protection and Conservation Association (HEPCA) said in a statement on Friday that photographs of the dead sharks and pictures of the attack shark taken shortly before one of the attacks showed they were not the same fish.

The environment ministry had said on Thursday that the dead sharks matched descriptions given by divers who rescued three wounded Russians and a Ukrainian after the attacks near Sharm El Sheikh on Tuesday and Wednesday.

"Comparing the photographs of the oceanic whitetip shark responsible for the 2nd attack with the images of the captured oceanic whitetip shark, it is clear that they don't show the same individual," HEPCA said in a statement.

The NGO said shark attacks were "extremely rare" and warned against "randomly catching and killing" large oceanic sharks in the area. The recent attacks were probably carried out by a single shark behaving abnormally, it said.

A 12-member conservation crew caught the first shark near Sharm El Sheikh, the ministry said, and the second was hunted later by local state environmental officers.

An oceanic whitetip shark bit off one diver's hand and caused severe leg and back injuries to the others, officials said. The victims were transferred to the Nasser Institute Hospital in Cairo and a swimming ban is in force on part of the coast.

Only 11 whitetip sharks the size of the shark responsible for the second attack have been identified in the Egyptian Red Sea over the past six years, HEPCA said.


Source: Reuters

[Netyoda]

Typical Egy authorities response _ i commented to a friend that it would probably be the wrong one

Does anyone remember the filn Jaws where the message was that all the authorities cared abot was tourism?

And now they're killing tons of reef sharks which do no harm to anyone!

[Jewel]

This is very upsetting and sickening - seeing the footage of the egyptians slaughtering sharks willy nilly and the way they handled them on ITV last night was appalling....talk about the usual approach of a sledgehammer to crack a nut? Remember the pigs?

Imagine yourself being captured, your arms and legs get cut off with a cleaver by your captors, for what reason, you do not know. Bleeding, you get thrown back onto the streets with no one around. Barely alive and conscious, a slow and painful death awaits...


To many, sharks are just ruthless killers. Sadly, Hollywood drama has made these magnificent creatures strike fear into our hearts by making them look like crazed man-hunters.

Most shark attacks occur because the sharks mistaken swimmers or surfers to be a seal or some other sea creatures. Other incidents may be due to us not giving them enough respect by encroaching too much into their habitat.

It is a fact that the red sea is overfished........they need food

In fact, ordinarily, according to International Shark Attack File, the chances of getting hit by lightning is much higher than that of being attacked by a shark

Now, let's look at the flip side of the coin. Mankind ruthlessly hunt down these majestic creatures, cut off their fins, and throw them back, alive, into the ocean, to drown... and to die a slow and painful death. And for what? Just so that some people can have 'Shark's fin' in their soup! (Typically a popular dish in Asian society and culture). It is estimated that 10–100 million sharks are slaughtered each year for their fins. Now who are the RUTHLESS KILLERS?!?

It is also thaught that the bodies of cattle (dumped into the sea after dying an agonising death en route on the long cramped cruel journey from Australia for sacrifice for eid el adha) had attracted the sharks.
So when you look at it from all angles the only possible conclusion to be sadly drawn that humans are directly responsible.......unsustainable tourism and an environmental disaster - we reap that which we sow, and in fact we should be trying to protect these wonderful creatures which are threatened with extinction.

That is the REAL tradgedy unfolding here

[Netyoda]

Totally in agreement Jewel - complete overreaction by the authorities as usual!

The white tip reefs are playful little buggers and although I do agree that a rogue Oceanic needs to be culled, slaughtering all these tiny sharks that cause nobody a problem is just stupidity!

There's a lot to be said about the animal carcasses being a cause. Sharks dine on fish, not red meat, and having access to so much of the red meat could easily turn one into a flesh-eater. Once sharks have tasted flesh it's common for them to seek it out.

Another cause of this happening is STUPID PEOPLE feeding meat to the sharks, on fishing or snorkelling trips. This was the cause of the German woman being killed in Marsa ALam a few years back and she got what she deserved because of it.

[Christine]

I agree with most of the above, and have it on very good authority that the sheep carcasses were indeed a lure for the hungry fish as " Shark sighting " tours were being set up the very same week the carcasses were dumped.
I do how ever think that death is a high price to pay for ignorance

[LovelyLadyLux]

Any updates on this? I heard about it at the time then not a word since and haven't seen anything lately on the News. Have the sharks just gone? Or were they all killed off?

[Hurghada Lady]

I haven't heard anything about it since either, but they are all swimming in the sea again

[Christine]

I have friends just back from Sharm and they are saying its old news, everyone is swimming again as HL says, funnily enough they couldnt book a Shark Sighting trip though , makes you wonder dosent it

[Netyoda]

All safe in the sea now, beaches all open although Channel 5 in the UK is broadcasting "Red Sea Jaws" next week, which will do the usual wonders for the tourism industry in Egypt.

[LovelyLadyLux]

Interesting. It was all over the News here and, at the time, I kinda thought that "IF" they don't get the shark thing under control they're going to lose lots of tourism there. Good the sharks are gone. Interesting this happened in the first place - shark attack in this area.

[Annadongela]

So has there been anything official? Has the offending shark been caught? At the time they were saying that one shark would communicate with another and let them know there were easy pickings (in shark language of course lol). Thinking of coming out in Feb but only if we can swim, nothing else to do in Sharm but swim lol!

[LovelyLadyLux]

Geez I never thought about Shark talk.....Maybe they're all out there talking to each other to plan a really coordinated attack. After I saw JAWS years ago NOTHING would suprise me about a shark.

I'm curious too and that was my initial query. Did they ever catch the offending attacker? Or is he now off to Hawaii and maybe different/better pickings?

[Netyoda]

They did catch one Oceanic White Tip but the next day another swimmer was killed, so it was probably the wrong one.

From what I've been able to ascertain they did not catch a second one, but the attacks stopped.

The Oceanic White Tip is a deep water shark and it probably tootled off to its natural habitat after its snack.

It was probably in the area to feed from the sheep carcasses which had been dumped after Eid.

I really wouldn't worry about swimming in the Red Sea, personally.

[Jayway]

Maybe someone would recommend a nice hotel, one with a large swimming pool, not an up-+-down olympic type, a curvy one with palm trees ?

[Christine]

I cant find anything official about the attacks, the starting of them or the ending of them, i still stand by my original theory, that the dumping of the carcasses played a massive and planned part in those attacks, as ive heard nothing to refute those theories, other than the shark sighting trips no longer being available , so i think its as safe as it always was now .
When i go back to Hurghada i shall surely be swimming in the sea