NASSAU, BAHAMAS – I feel like a medieval knight as I slide my arms into the chain-mail sleeves. Christian Andreani, my dive master, cinches the protective armour across my back and briefs me on the dive: “Keep your hands in close. If a shark bites you on the arm, hold your arm tight to your chest. It will eventually let go. Whatever happens, don’t let it pull your arm away from you.”
I’m on the back deck of the MV Tursiops, one of Stuart Cove’s dive boats in Nassau, Bahamas, getting ready to take part in a shark feed. I can see the sleek outlines of Caribbean reef sharks circling the boat, and begin to have second thoughts about signing up for this. Andreani, a muscular Frenchman with a shaved head and goatee, slaps me on the back. “Nice knowing you,” he says with a grin.
I have come with Stuart Cove’s Dive Center to a site called the Shark Wall for one of the most popular shark-feeding dives on the planet — last year, the outfitter hosted about 20,000 scuba divers and snorkellers. Since Stuart Cove began offering these exhilarating encounters in the early 1990s, the dives have become extremely popular, and are now offered by operators around the world.
But they are not without controversy: Critics feel that the sharks’ behaviour is being altered to appeal to divers, while others argue that the feedings increase the risk of attacks on people.
With the chain mail on, I sink like an anchor. When I hit the sandy bottom 12 metres below, the other dive masters usher me into position. A dozen visiting divers, who are not wearing chain mail, are kneeling in a semi-circle. (Since I’m taking photos, and will be closer to the action, I need protective armour.)
The shark feeder, wearing a full-body chain-mail suit and a silver motorcycle-style helmet, hits the water carrying a metal box of bait. The sharks seem to double in number. There must be at least 50. They surround me. Most are about two metres long.
They attack the metal box, banging their snouts against the lid. With a hand-held spear, the feeder reaches in and pulls out a fish. Two sharks hit the bait simultaneously, writhing so furiously that I feel the shockwaves from their bodies. I duck as a shark dashes toward me. They come in from all angles and swim clockwise around the feeder, enveloping him like a tornado.
I’m bumped by sharks. I’m careful to heed Andreani’s advice and keep my arms in tight like a boxer’s defensive stance. If a shark bites a limb, it will instinctively begin thrashing to tear flesh, which can be dangerous even with chain mail.
But amid the frenzy there seems to be an element of control. The feeder reaches into the sealed box and takes out one fish at a time. Not giving up everything at once, he controls the tempo of the feed.
This technique was developed in movie-making. Stuart Cove himself got his start in 1977 as a shark wrangler on the set of the James Bond movie For Your Eyes Only, with Roger Moore. He found using a baited spear was the best way to get a shark to swim across the frame for filming. He quickly became Hollywood’s go-to guy for sharks. In 1983, he trained Sean Connery and Kim Basinger to scuba-dive in Never Say Never Again. Since then, Cove’s sharks have appeared in dozens of documentaries and feature films.
At his dive centre, Cove now offers reef and wreck diving as well as shark dives. More recently, he has begun running snorkelling trips with the sharks. Typically, two shark dives are done on each trip. The first is without feeding, so divers can observe the sharks in their natural environment. On this dive, there are few sharks, and they stay back a good distance. The second dive is the feed.
For most divers, shark feeds are the only way to see these predators up close in the wild. Sharks are instinctively afraid of people, and seeing one is a rare occurrence. In 15 years of diving, the only time I have ever been close to sharks has been during feeds.
But some people liken the practice of feeding sharks to feeding bears in national parks. In Florida, the issue came to a head after several attacks on swimmers in the summer of 2001, which the media dubbed “The Summer of the Shark.”
The attack on eight-year-old Jesse Arbogast, in which the young boy lost an arm to a two-metre-long bull shark, riveted many viewers in the United States. Despite a lack of evidence that shark dives by local charter operators had anything to do with the attacks, dive operators were vilified in the media and legislation was quickly passed to prohibit feedings.
Larry Speaker, a friendly Floridian who was managing Cove’s dive centre when I visited, disagrees with the move. “Shark dives are extraordinarily safe when you follow the protocols,” he says, pointing out that there has never been a serious accident during Stuart Cove’s dives. In fact, there have only been a handful of minor injuries — usually caused by careless divers flailing their limbs near the feeding — requiring nothing more than a few stitches.
As for shark attacks on swimmers on Bahamian beaches, there has been no increase since the shark dives began in the early 1990s.
Speaker does not buy the argument that feeding sharks causes an association with humans and food. “If they associated boats with food, they’d follow us to other dive sites. But that doesn’t happen.”
The sharks stay at the feeding sites and come out only when fed. “If it was dangerous, people would be getting hurt all the time. By taking people on these dives, we’re trying to reprogram the Hollywood myths.”
Geoff Burgess, who manages the International Shark Attack File for the Florida Museum of Natural History, agrees that the feedings probably have no effect on shark attacks. (The summer of 2005 also saw several highly publicized shark attacks in Florida, despite the state’s ban on feeding.)
Burgess is more concerned with how the feedings affect the sharks. “Sharks are a highly migratory species. We don’t know how their movements are being altered around feeding sites.” He believes the feedings may lead to changes in their behaviour and the ecology of the areas where they occur. He also feels the experiences are less-than-authentic. “What people come to see are sharks in their natural environment, but what they see are highly trained animals.”
Back in the water, as the last of the bait is fed to the sharks, things begin to calm down. The sharks’ erratic motion becomes fluid and graceful again. The school surrounding the feeder disperses as the sharks cruise off into the blue. I follow the other divers forward, and begin sifting through the white sand with my fingers. After several minutes, I find two small teeth left behind by the sharks, tiny souvenirs from the deep.
Pack your bags
WHERE TO STAY
Nassau Beach Hotel: http://www.nassaubeachhotel.com; 1-888-627-7282. Rates start at $120 a night for a standard room.
SHARK DIVES
Stuart Cove’s Dive Bahamas: 1-800-879-9832; http://www.stuartcove.com. Two shark dives cost $155.
Walker’s Cay Undersea Adventures: Walker’s Cay, Bahamas; 1-800-327-8150; www.nealwatson.com/WalkersCay.html. Two dive shark encounters, $110.
There are many outfitters in different parts of the world that offer scuba trips in waters where divers are likely to encounter sharks. They include:
Peter Hughes Diving: Florida; 1-800-932-6237; http://www.peterhughes.com.
Aggressor Fleet: Hawaii; 1-800-348-2628; http://www.aggressor.com.
Mollie Dean Cruises: Lami, Fiji; 679-336-1171; http://www.sere.com.fj.
MORE INFORMATION
The Islands of the Bahamas Tourism: 1-800-224-2627; http://www.bahamas.com.
By DARRYL LENIUK
From Saturday’s Globe and Mail
http://www.theglobeandmail.com
