www.perthnow.com.au/news/wa/shark-attack-surfer-attacked-at-falcon-near-mandurah-ng-33428f17cd7885b7d45ca212f033e84c

Wow that is pretty close to your home base Mick. Hope he survives without his leg. Terrible news. Rose was just reading this out to me and saying isn't that where you are from - so I jumped on here and was relieved to see you had posted already !

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Ted the Kiwi said..
Wow that is pretty close to your home base Mick. Hope he survives without his leg. Terrible news. Rose was just reading this out to me and saying isn't that where you are from - so I jumped on here and was relieved to see you had posted already !

I can see the search helicopter buzzing around looking for the culprit out my window mate...yep bloody horrible turn of events

Just saw this on the news. 30 years old. Awesome effort from the three blokes who helped him in after 15+ blokes paddled away (not that you can blame them - not pointing the finger at all).

A mate of mine helped get Brad Smiths body in and gave up surfing. These things can change you. When my Uncle was taken it stopped me enjoying lonely surfs.

The poor bloke is obviously the main concern, but it will reach further than him sadly.

Thoughts with all the family, friends and witnesses of both the recent tragedies. I hope he recovers as swiftly as possible.

Not nice ,at least he's alive unlike the Gnarloo surfer ...dunno why they don't wear a helmet over shallow coral....!

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thedrip said..
Just saw this on the news. 30 years old. Awesome effort from the three blokes who helped him in after 15+ blokes paddled away (not that you can blame them - not pointing the finger at all).

A mate of mine helped get Brad Smiths body in and gave up surfing. These things can change you. When my Uncle was taken it stopped me enjoying lonely surfs.

The poor bloke is obviously the main concern, but it will reach further than him sadly.

Thoughts with all the family, friends and witnesses of both the recent tragedies. I hope he recovers as swiftly as possible.

Powerful post Drip.

Thoughts and prayers with Ben and his family

Lots of people at the spot on my way home. I didn't stop, I didn't feel like talking to people. Pulled into the boat ramp to look at the ocean as I often do & a guy was paddling out to the spot next door ironically called sharkies. The waves did look really nice there. I popped in & had a look at my local. Car park was packed so I kept driving, some people in wetties. HAs been great winds with a decent swell the last couple of days.

Online media reports that a shark has been caught off the location of the tragedy a couple of hours ago. I hope they killed the farker & many more...

Those guys who stayed out with him and brought him back to land deserve a medal of the highest level.I've read a lot on this attack it sure was horrific.

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MickPC said..
Lots of people at the spot on my way home. I didn't stop, I didn't feel like talking to people. Pulled into the boat ramp to look at the ocean as I often do & a guy was paddling out to the spot next door ironically called sharkies. The waves did look really nice there. I popped in & had a look at my local. Car park was packed so I kept driving, some people in wetties. HAs been great winds with a decent swell the last couple of days.

Online media reports that a shark has been caught off the location of the tragedy a couple of hours ago. I hope they killed the farker & many more...

Warnings for days before hand, even the morning of the attack of a large shark sighted in the area. No signs at any beaches. 18 hours after the attack finally signs have now been erected warning people of the danger. Drum lines in the water, a reported 2 mtr shark on the line (Too small to have been the attacker) and currently left on the line to thrash around over night. Baited Drum lines apparently to stay in the water for days to come,
Id be surfing well away from your local beaches if i was you Mick..

If people are out surfing currently then surely they must take responsibility for their own actions..

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jbshack said..

MickPC said..
Lots of people at the spot on my way home. I didn't stop, I didn't feel like talking to people. Pulled into the boat ramp to look at the ocean as I often do & a guy was paddling out to the spot next door ironically called sharkies. The waves did look really nice there. I popped in & had a look at my local. Car park was packed so I kept driving, some people in wetties. HAs been great winds with a decent swell the last couple of days.

Online media reports that a shark has been caught off the location of the tragedy a couple of hours ago. I hope they killed the farker & many more...

Warnings for days before hand, even the morning of the attack of a large shark sighted in the area. No signs at any beaches. 18 hours after the attack finally signs have now been erected warning people of the danger. Drum lines in the water, a reported 2 mtr shark on the line (Too small to have been the attacker) and currently left on the line to thrash around over night. Baited Drum lines apparently to stay in the water for days to come,
Id be surfing well away from your local beaches if i was you Mick..

If people are out surfing currently then surely they must take responsibility for their own actions..

JB we were having samon runs for days n days in recent weeks before this happened & we often see sharks. If we didn't surf according to warning signs mate, I mean natures signs & getting a visual sighting of a shark on one of our other beaches. We would have very few surfing days.

People in the past did not receive warnings on dangerous times to enter the ocean. And people in the past did not have to put up with GW shark protection & d1ckheads attracting sharks to humans in cages for tourist $. This is the problem, more sharks, greater risk as a result of higher chance of contact & altered shark behaviour as a result of human/food association.

When I heard someone had been attacked by a shark yesterday I had hoped it might be another bite on the foot or leg like the last two recent incidents here, a few stitches & a story. Unfortunately the loss of a leg & blood loss could also cause a brain injury. So we're hoping at this time that that is not the case...

Seriously mate we've been down this road too many times & there comes a time when you gotta start thinking maybe the protection of great whites was a bad idea. I've been surfing a long time. Started when I was 8 in 1980 & never worried about sharks until I surfed cactus in 96. GW protection started in like '98. Just take a look at incidents between 1980 or even 1970 in Oz up until say 2000. Then look at the incidents that have occured between 2000 & now. No matter how you read them there has been a significant rise in incidents since the GW protection which was simply brought about by fisherman stating, "hey you know what we don't see so many GW's these days". No research had concluded less sharks then & no true research can claim to know how many there are now (only guessstimates). But guess what, fisherman & surfers are saying they are seeing a lot more than before & many of us believe GW's do not need protecting anymore.

I don't want to see a cull, I just want to see the GW shark protection lifted to a point where over a certain size can be captured & killed by professional fisherman offering tourist fishing to people into that kinda thing & I hope that would return us to those days where surfing was not such a high risk activity.

I'm not interested in BS statistics. Ma & Pa bogan drink driving there way over to McPooPoo have a higher chance of running some barstard over not looking left & right before they cross the road. I'm a surfer & I want to get in the water as often as possible. Especially when the surf has been great like the last couple of days. That could easily have been me in hospital right now had I not been out of the water injured. I hope for Ben to come good asap & for changes to be made to help prevent more tragedy's to follow.

Sorry but I disagree Mick.

It's not a cull it's fishing....
If fisheries had put drum lines out upon first sighting of the shark several days ago and caught it we wouldn't be having this again, and again.
My first few years on crazy boats we set shark hooks on every first and twentieth pot over 100 pots that's 10 shark hooks per day. There was 300 other licenses doing the same in wa (it's called fishing)
That is over 3000 shark hooks per day in wa in the water.............
A cray licence was always a west coast Demersel licence with a craypot endorsement.
Did we catch great whites? You betcha, one or two a season and so did the other 300 licenses.... At least 5-600 great whites were caught every year, did the ocean collapse ? No would it off at those numbers? Well it had been going on for 50 years with the same catch results so in essence it was as close to sustainable as any other fishery if not more so.
I feel for the family and the fella who was attacked, the guys who did the right thing and got him in are champions. I hope he surfs again and recovers well
the attacks are closer and closer to home and by default out of the last 4-5 I have personally known 2 of the guys. This is affecting my surf time and my kids surf time, anyone who states otherwise is delusional or has no understanding of how many sharks are now trained to associate humans as food.
When we caught sharks off the boat you wouldn't see them till they were on the line, the sharks that ate people were not seen by others in the water or beach.......
Nowadays the sharks make a point of been seen and taunting other people whilst they take their victim, it is a learned and not natural behaviour
These attacks can be stopped, stop cage diving and start fishing that's all.

I'm neither pro or against a cull but I believe if the GW is the king of the ocean which hunts without being hunted surely this causes some form of unbalance and why we are seeing more attacks?

i just wanted to wish the best to the surfer and his family also to the people of WA.
being a surfer its always sad to hear surf communities going through this.

Two very defined points of view re: Sharks.

Either way its horrible and a complete tragedy when someone is impacted by a shark encounter that's causes harm or death.

Same as if its a poor sole surfing with his son at Tombies who dies when hitting the reef

Or when a mother and her two children are killed in a car accident.

The latter happens more than either of the other two, yet the emotions run higher regarding sharks. It's as though we've accepted road fatality as a way of life but not the right to life of a species in its natural habitat and the risk we take as watermen.

If an eagle or falcon attacks a sky diver should we hunt them?

Glad the young bloke at Gearies survived and wish with all my heart that he one day returns to the surf as hard and challenging that that will be.

Im not going to go all sharky but one reply. The Marine scientific community has confirmed around 700 breading/mature Great whites on the West coast. Even with numbers that low, attacks are still happening. So culling a hundred more or 200 more, when will you be happy, you have said wipe them all out, then what? Tigers, Bull sharks..Seals with K-9s were do you call it quits

4 warnings in two days of a large great white, id like to see a sign at the beach. 18 hours after an attack at a beach, i think a warning sign is warranted.

Now we have the fisheries circus, they caught A shark, the chances of it being THE shark we will never know, because they destroyed the shark and refused donating it to UWA for scientific testing.

Fisheries have no drum lines in the water but are still actively patrolling and beach still closed, i wonder why..

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MickPC said..

jbshack said..

MickPC said..
Lots of people at the spot on my way home. I didn't stop, I didn't feel like talking to people. Pulled into the boat ramp to look at the ocean as I often do & a guy was paddling out to the spot next door ironically called sharkies. The waves did look really nice there. I popped in & had a look at my local. Car park was packed so I kept driving, some people in wetties. HAs been great winds with a decent swell the last couple of days.

Online media reports that a shark has been caught off the location of the tragedy a couple of hours ago. I hope they killed the farker & many more...

Warnings for days before hand, even the morning of the attack of a large shark sighted in the area. No signs at any beaches. 18 hours after the attack finally signs have now been erected warning people of the danger. Drum lines in the water, a reported 2 mtr shark on the line (Too small to have been the attacker) and currently left on the line to thrash around over night. Baited Drum lines apparently to stay in the water for days to come,
Id be surfing well away from your local beaches if i was you Mick..

If people are out surfing currently then surely they must take responsibility for their own actions..

JB we were having samon runs for days n days in recent weeks before this happened & we often see sharks. If we didn't surf according to warning signs mate, I mean natures signs & getting a visual sighting of a shark on one of our other beaches. We would have very few surfing days.

People in the past did not receive warnings on dangerous times to enter the ocean. And people in the past did not have to put up with GW shark protection & d1ckheads attracting sharks to humans in cages for tourist $. This is the problem, more sharks, greater risk as a result of higher chance of contact & altered shark behaviour as a result of human/food association.

When I heard someone had been attacked by a shark yesterday I had hoped it might be another bite on the foot or leg like the last two recent incidents here, a few stitches & a story. Unfortunately the loss of a leg & blood loss could also cause a brain injury. So we're hoping at this time that that is not the case...

Seriously mate we've been down this road too many times & there comes a time when you gotta start thinking maybe the protection of great whites was a bad idea. I've been surfing a long time. Started when I was 8 in 1980 & never worried about sharks until I surfed cactus in 96. GW protection started in like '98. Just take a look at incidents between 1980 or even 1970 in Oz up until say 2000. Then look at the incidents that have occured between 2000 & now. No matter how you read them there has been a significant rise in incidents since the GW protection which was simply brought about by fisherman stating, "hey you know what we don't see so many GW's these days". No research had concluded less sharks then & no true research can claim to know how many there are now (only guessstimates). But guess what, fisherman & surfers are saying they are seeing a lot more than before & many of us believe GW's do not need protecting anymore.

I don't want to see a cull, I just want to see the GW shark protection lifted to a point where over a certain size can be captured & killed by professional fisherman offering tourist fishing to people into that kinda thing & I hope that would return us to those days where surfing was not such a high risk activity.

I'm not interested in BS statistics. Ma & Pa bogan drink driving there way over to McPooPoo have a higher chance of running some barstard over not looking left & right before they cross the road. I'm a surfer & I want to get in the water as often as possible. Especially when the surf has been great like the last couple of days. That could easily have been me in hospital right now had I not been out of the water injured. I hope for Ben to come good asap & for changes to be made to help prevent more tragedy's to follow.

30 years ago Vic Hislop said,"if you protect GWS now, you're going to need protection yourselves in 30 years time"!...

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Al G said..

30 years ago Vic Hislop said,"if you protect GWS now, you're going to need protection yourselves in 30 years time"!...

He was right...farken ridiculous having a no touch protection on one bloody fish and JB. If the bloody things were not protected researchers could research the mongrel things a lot easier also. They could get out there & catch their own, more the farking merrier imo.

You been in the water since the attack Mick?
Plenty of people surfing out front of my place today

Was going to tomorrow, but winds look sh1t...just starting to feel back to normal after stopping meds day before last. Only slight dizziness/imbalance now.

www.mandurahmail.com.au/story/3945187/fundraiser-set-up-for-mandurah-shark-attack-victim/

www.gofundme.com/27ftd94z

Vic Heslop was a shark hunter, he had one interest only and promoted that milking people fears. A lot of what he said we know as a Crock, but those that knew better and could back it up with data weren't given the airtime back then because it wasn't as "dramatic" Then when someone actually gave science a voice he went away,tail between his legs, no where to go, pulled him out of the closet on occasions to hype it up.

When people are scared they don't want to understand, it doesn't make the scary things go away. When people start to understand what happens to the marine ecosystems when they get stuffed up a few more people might go
"ohhhh, well,... ill be buggered, if only i had know that...." All when its too late. Someone thought the introduction of Cane Toads was a good idea as well, once. Its like saying an engine with moving parts will run better without lubrication.

Sure manage and mitigate sharks so people can go into the water and recreate without fear, but do it with technology or research other non fatal means until the populations of the scary beasts reach a sustainable level. When they reach a sustainable level sure, manage it, but gent's we aren't there yet.

The roll on effects of taking GW's out of the mix will create more issues to more ocean users in the long term and that's a fact, then everyone will say...how could they let this happen? There's a bigger picture and other changes managing fisheries and habitats that can will make a difference.

Fact remains that in Australia there have been 232 fatalities from Sharks in 225 years

There have been over 400 fatalities in Australia on our roads 2016 to date alone!, that's effectively 5 months. so lets say there were 300 a year Australia wide over the last 50 years, and that's conservative, there's 15,000 fatalities!

You are far greater risk driving to the surf than being in it, that's the fact, but we seem to have accepted death on our roads, yet that's something we actually have much more control over and seem care less about.

Protecting one species of fish & not others is interfering with the ecology of the ocean.

No one has said to kill them all & comparing general statistics is irrelevant as they have no bearing on the lifestyle of each & every surfer. Certainly not me, I barely get over 40 when I drive to the beach & I'm there in less than 2 mins.

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MickPC said..
Protecting one species of fish & not others is interfering with the ecology of the ocean.

No one has said to kill them all & comparing general statistics is irrelevant as they have no bearing on the lifestyle of each & every surfer. Certainly not me, I barely get over 40 when I drive to the beach & I'm there in less than 2 mins.

Consider yourself lucky you live that close to the beach

Fromthe SB room

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LateStarter said...

jjd said..
This thread is about some poor bugger who lost half his leg.
Can we please have a little respect and save the pro/anti-shark comments to a later date, preferably on another thread?
Thanks

VERY WELL SAID.

This poor bugger is far from out of the woods yet, and some of the behavior and comments online and on social media have been absolutely appalling.

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DARTH said..

MickPC said..
Protecting one species of fish & not others is interfering with the ecology of the ocean.

No one has said to kill them all & comparing general statistics is irrelevant as they have no bearing on the lifestyle of each & every surfer. Certainly not me, I barely get over 40 when I drive to the beach & I'm there in less than 2 mins.

Consider yourself lucky you live that close to the beach

Oh I do mate, I consider myself very lucky

SP it is true there have been apalling comments made online & in social media. It has been good to see none of them here on the Seabreeze forums.

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MickPC said..

Al G said..

30 years ago Vic Hislop said,"if you protect GWS now, you're going to need protection yourselves in 30 years time"!...

He was right...farken ridiculous having a no touch protection on one bloody fish and JB. If the bloody things were not protected researchers could research the mongrel things a lot easier also. They could get out there & catch their own, more the farking merrier imo.

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MickPC said..
Protecting one species of fish & not others is interfering with the ecology of the ocean.

No one has said to kill them all & comparing general statistics is irrelevant as they have no bearing on the lifestyle of each & every surfer. Certainly not me, I barely get over 40 when I drive to the beach & I'm there in less than 2 mins.

Protecting one species and not others, doesn't effect me either, I'm not a fish.

Glad you don't get over 40 kmph when driving to the beach, you are then likely to be one less muppet on the road i need to worry about killing my family. Doesn't mean your safe from some muppet ploughing into you doing three times that.

Too many people die minding their own business doing nothing wrong but pay the ultimate price because of the actions of others. Sorry man, but that's why i thought the "General statistics" were relevant. Puts risks into perspective.

Really hope Ben recovers quickly and gets back into the line up one day in the not too distant and sounds like all the local crew are pretty rattled for obvious reasons so wishing 'em all back in to the water and again big "RESPECT" to those that saved his life.

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Surf69 said..

Really hope Ben recovers quickly and gets back into the line up one day in the not too distant and sounds like all the local crew are pretty rattled for obvious reasons so wishing 'em all back in to the water and again big "RESPECT" to those that saved his life.

Well that's one thing we can agree on at least & at this point in time the most important one.

232 fatalities In how many years?

Where do these stats come from?

What about the presumed drowned stats?...No body was found??? Couldn't have got eaten could they?

www.mandurahmail.com.au/story/3945187/fundraiser-set-up-for-mandurah-shark-attack-victim/

www.gofundme.com/27ftd94z