Top 5 myths about sharks
1. FICTION: Sharks want to eat people.
FACT: We are not on the sharks’ menu. Sharks rarely attack people and would much prefer to eat fish or marine mammals. Millions of people around the world use the oceans every year without incident. In 2018, there were a total of 5 human deaths and 66 unprovoked encounters worldwide. In the U.S., that is less than 0.2 attacks per million people.
2. FICTION: Sharks are the number one cause of animal related deaths.
FACT: On average, sharks kill 6 people a year while mosquitos kill 750,000, snakes kill 100,000, dogs kill 35,000, freshwater snails kill 20,000+, crocodiles kill 1,000, and hippos and elephants each kill about 500.
3. FICTION: Sharks can smell blood a mile away.
FACT: Sharks can smell a drop of blood at a proportion of about one part per 10 billion or about a pinpoint sized drop in an Olympic sized swimming pool. That’s, at most, a distance of a couple of football fields- definitely not a mile.
4. FICTION: Sharks are attracted to human blood, so if you cut yourself at the beach, you will be attracting sharks.
FACT: Sharks know the difference between fish and human blood and, while they can smell our blood, it is not a scent they associate with food. Scientific experiments have repeatedly shown that sharks have no interest in human blood.
5. FICTION: All sharks are like great whites.
FACT: There are over 530 species of sharks and only a handful have been responsible for the majority of attacks on humans: great whites, tigers and bull sharks.