…By Larry John for TDPel Media.
Brit tourist Simon Nellist’s death from a 15ft great white shark attack in Sydney has been classified as a “provoked incident.
” The International Shark Attack File report describes his death as such despite Nellist not deliberately doing anything to alarm the shark.
The report also cites fishing as the activity that draws sharks, making Nellist’s death provoked.
The former RAF gunner was swimming in fishing waters when he was set upon by the beast on February 16 last year.
Nellist died in front of traumatised beachgoers off Little Bay beach, making him the first fatal victim of a shark attack in Sydney in 60 years.
According to Gavin Naylor, director of the Florida Programme for Shark Research, Mr Nellist’s death was excluded from the unprovoked attack statistics “because we do not consider it an unprovoked incident.
” While Mr Nellist did nothing consciously to provoke the incident, he was swimming in an area where people were fishing, making it an incident provoked by human activity.
“Any factor that draws sharks to an area (fishing, chumming, scalloping, etc.) or behaviour that goad the shark, riding them, petting them, feeding them (you might be surprised what people do!) are thought to induce behaviours that are not ‘typical’,” Naylor explained.
Despite Nellist’s horrifying death, his family said he would not have wanted the shark to be destroyed.
His aunt Jacqui Seager said, “I don’t think Simon would want the shark to be killed.
He loved nature.”
She added that he had swum with sharks before, and it was not the first time he had gone out and seen them.
She said, “He would still go out swimming.
That’s brave.
I don’t think he ever thought they would hurt him.
Sadly, this time it managed to get to him.”
The news of the classification of Nellist’s death as a “provoked incident” has raised discussions on what constitutes a provoked or unprovoked shark attack.
The International Shark Attack File categorizes incidents based on individual circumstances, and factors such as human activity have been identified as reasons to classify them as “provoked incidents.”
However, critics argue that such categorizations oversimplify the complexity of shark behavior and can have negative implications for conservation efforts.