Shark encounters within the US Northeast: The rise defined

Shark encounters in the US Northeast: The increase explained

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But are New York’s Long Island and Cape Cod, the peninsula of Massachusetts, where many of the recent suspected shark encounters have taken place, experiencing anything exceptional? Yes and no, according to Gavin Naylor, director of the Florida Program for Shark Research at the University of Florida in Gainesville.

Globally, shark attacks are at similar levels to previous years, said Naylor, who is also a curator of the Florida Museum of Natural History, but there are signs that the Northeast coast of the US might be seeing an uptick.

“We are right on trend for this time of year. I think globally, we usually get between 70 and 80 unprovoked bites by sharks around the world. But that’s a global phenomenon. And it’s distributed in a patchy way,” Naylor explained.

“One year we might have two or three bites in Hawaii in rapid succession. Next year, it could be New Caledonia; it could be in Western Australia. And this year, it’s off the coast of Long Island.”

Naylor declined to give the…

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