How Researchers Keep Humans Safe From Shark Attacks (180°)| Damage Control | WIRED

sharks are a vastly diverse group of species there's 550 of different species of shark they occupy almost every aquatic bio region on the planet and you know in this game called evolution they've done incredibly well and diversified to such an extent we see this amazing diversity of sharks today sharks are everywhere and have been for a very long time scientists believe sharks may have first appeared around 455 million years ago most of these millions of years they evolved in relative isolation from humans but new research suggests however that climate change and human industry are degrading shark habitats leading to an uptick in shark attacks as humans and sharks converge how can we prevent mutual harm today we're looking at emerging technologies designed to keep humans safe in the water the challenges in designing these technologies and whether they need to exist in the first place this is damage control we traveled down to the Bahamas to speak with some experts on shark human interactions my name is dr. Owen O'Shea and I'm the executive director and principal research scientists for the Center for ocean research and education here in the Bahamas well sharks most sharks anyways sit at the top of the food chain they're regarded as apex predators and they they regulate the food chain from the top they have this top-down control they're actually enforcing a harmony within very complicated coastal and offshore populations of other sea life that harmony is increasingly being disrupted by the influence of humans shark populations now face man-made dangers such as longline commercial fishing thinning habitat destruction and ecosystem pollution the Bahamas there's a lot of aggressive urbanization coastal development cruise ship terminals dredging that sort of thing on the other hand humans face a growing fear of shark attack number of attacks has risen dramatically over the past 50 years climate change is heating waters along the equator pushing aquatic creatures poleward according to a study by NOAA the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration as sharks seek cooler water as they come in to increase in contact with surfers and beachgoers who flocked to subtropical coastlines in record numbers more people in the water means more potential for incident having evolved in isolation from humans sharks don't normally see them as food or pose a threat but changes in habitats have been shown to provoke changes in behavior and one bite is often enough to provoke a significant human response this woman this unfortunate woman the victim of the attack a mother of three she's in the hospital tonight critical condition the long tough road ahead of her between 2013 and 2018 there was an estimated average of 81 unprovoked shark attacks on humans reported worldwide some causing fatalities and others not however varying reports on the number of those killed by lightning every year ranged from two thousand six thousand or even 24,000 people no matter how you look at it sharks are a substantially smaller threat to us than lightning everything is completely sensationalized and the fact that these interactions are so rare and relative to the amount of sharks that are killed by us every year it's it's just ridiculous because of this fear the races aren't develop technologies that will protect water goers from potential interactions with sharks but how effective is this technology the Bahamas may be the best place in the world to do a deep dive into these questions home to one of 21 official shark sanctuaries the Bahamas have been instrumental in the rehabilitation of shark populations DePalma severe Sharkey even before the shark sanctuary was put into effect we had tons of sharks I'm Stuart Cove and I own Stewart goes dive Bahamas where voice had a very healthy population sharks it made sense that's protected now or we have it this is one of the few places in the world where sharks are afforded a blanket protection and therefore one of the most amazing places to come and see sharks and dive with sharks in the world it's no wonder then that the Bahamas is the go-to destination for researchers around the world seeking to understand and minimize shark human interactions wearable electric field based shark deterrents such as shark bands and shark shield theoretically manipulate the sensitive sensory organs unique to sharks sharp and is essentially a magnet that you strapped to your wrist or to your ankle I'm an evolutionary biologist and so I study their evolution and have been studying sharks for about thirty years when you've got a magnet strapped to your ankle and you move it up and down it induces a current now sharks have got these incredibly sensitive electrical receptors around this now they're essentially these tiny pores they can detect the the my newest of y/o electrical signals and serve if you've got it on your ankle and you're kicking up and down it's gonna generate an electrical field and if the Sharks swimming around in this the shots will recognize that something's a little bit awry and there will be deterred and will move away that's the logic behind it and what we found is that there wasn't any effect of the show based on the behavior of the sharks and the shark Mans didn't reduce the number of baits being taken by the shark either and that is because the effect that the magnets can have on sharks is limited to a very very close range and that if you let's say have a magnet on your ankle on your wrist you had or your food might be protected since wearable deterrents drop off at short range researchers have developed other technologies to looking at a shark you wouldn't even think to look for their ears but a shark's auditory system is one of the most sophisticated aspects of the Sharks hunting behavior there have been some recently published studies that have suggested that you know a sudden onset of sound or a very loud sounds might have some sort of deterrent effect now in the water it travels a lot further particularly low-frequency sound when it's in the water you know sharks are known to respond to a very low sort of frequency up to about 2000 Hertz I think it peaks at about a hundred Hertz where sharks are sort of really interested and those that they are the ranges where you can manipulate the patterns in that frequency range and see which patterns induced behaviors that would suggest that the animals don't like it and they reversal but can a universal deterrent even exist each of these technologies seeks to repel sharks by manipulating their Anatomy but therein lies the challenge shots are incredibly varied a white shark is as different from a black tip shot as a human is from a dog so I think some of these devices can be useful but just because something works on bull sharks in the Bahamas does not mean that it's gonna danke la popa shots in the Humboldt Current which is much much colder people are always trying to find a repellent that works universally on all shots and that's a problem and even if we could find one technology to deter all species of sharks should we the problem is that once you say that something works as a shelter then people become emboldened and they think that they're immune and then they start taking risks that they should not take another actually seen this myself when people would be going surfing in places they wouldn't normally and in places would it put themself at higher risk than anything they are because they're having a device that they think it works but they actually don't work researchers say that technology in the absence of understanding is risky informing the public and using tools that better understands the animals I think it's important to study any animal really for me personally it's it's an honor to learn about creatures that I share this planet with and I think that we should learn about sharks to understand really that not only are they absolutely critical for ecosystem health and overall health of our oceans but they really are not the you know sort of mindless killing machines that the media certainly tries to make them out to be we take about 60,000 people to interact with the sharks and the cool thing about it is they might come in frightened but when they leave they're excited about sharks and now their shark ambassadors so every year we're creating 60,000 people that go out into the world and promote the protection of sharks while attack prevention technology may still be in development the reality is that humans pose a far greater threat to sharks than the other way around education is the key to understanding how we can coexist and make for a stronger and more robust ecosystem [Music]

Channel: WIRED

Views: 272,290

Rating: 4.57652 out of 5

Keywords: Wired, sharks, shark attack, humans and sharks, shark, sharks attack, protections from sharks, shark tank, shark cage, shark diving, shark research, shark human interactions, shark researchers, electric field based shark deterrent, shark bands, shark band wrist band, wrist band sharks, shark wrist bands, shark deterrent, shark deterrents, stopping sharks, shark attack stopping, how to stop sharks, how to stop shark attacks, shark attack deterrent, shark attack research

Id: VQyqHj-BAbs

Length: 10min 32sec (632 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 24 2020