Three Influencers Bitten by Sharks in Under a Year
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- Tayane Dalazen, a 37-year-old Brazilian lawyer and social media personality from São Paulo, was bitten on the thigh by a seven-foot nurse shark in April during a shark-diving trip on the Brazilian coast; she later learned tour operators were feeding sharks to encourage tourist interactions.
- At least three influencers have been bitten by sharks in less than a year, including a fishing influencer who nearly lost his leg to a reef shark while spearfishing in July and a Chinese content creator bitten in the Maldives in December.
- The International Shark Attack File told the BBC it has documented a marked increase over the past three years in people being bitten while trying to film sharks.
- Shark scientist Kristian Parton said he now sees risky close-contact shark videos 'every single week' and warned of 'really serious incidents'; Dr. Jack Cooper separately dismissed influencer claims of conservation value as 'ludicrous.'
- A February 2024 Caribbean tourist lost both hands trying to photograph a bull shark from the shallows, and two months later an Israeli snorkeler carrying a selfie stick was killed by sharks while attempting photos.
- Ocean Ramsey, the shark content creator who went viral in 2019 swimming alongside a great white, denies her close-contact footage causes harm, insisting sharks 'choose to interact' with her first.
- A recent study of 'swim with wildlife' expeditions found influencers and photographers were most likely to ignore safety instructions; TripAdvisor currently lists more than 140 shark experiences in the Maldives alone.
Why it matters: Three influencer bites in under a year breaks from the historically stable ~70 unprovoked shark bites annually worldwide, with experts attributing the rise to social media incentives rather than shark behavior. The footage itself reaches tens of millions of viewers, and experts warn it normalizes behavior that has already cost one tourist both hands and another his life.
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