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Jun. 10th, 2005 12:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thejunipertreeNothing like a shark attack off the coast of New Jersey to brighten up my morning.
Excuse me, alledged shark attack.
It's amusing how NJ officials are refusing to state what happened. I saw the photos of the bite and it certainly looked like a shark attack to me.
The teenager who was bitten got off easy, as well. They're saying that it was possibly a small great white and he came out of this with fifty or sixty stitches. Psshaw. Child's play. He's lucky to be alive, let alone still have all his limbs.
We haven't had an attack off our coast since 1975, which has always astounded me. There's a lot of sharks in these waters. Mako and great whites, even. And it's always been a point of interest for me, that they never attacked anyone. Until now, that is.
At least there hasn't been any huge outcry of Let's go kill 'em! Far too often that is the reaction of locals when a shark does what it is meant to do: hunt and eat.
In my reading about this incident, I came across some information that an aquarium in California recently had a great white being held in capitivity. For 198 days, I believe, which is a record. Before that, I think they were only able to keep one for about sixty days before it went tits up. This one, a female, ate heartily while there, grew about a foot and gained something like a hundred pounds. They released it, with a transmitter attached, after she killed two other sharks in the aquarium and began exhibiting hunting behaviour towards the other fish.
God bless her. I hope she lives for many more decades, safe from human meddling.
I love sharks, in case that isn't obvious. The great whites, most of all. One of my biggest dreams is to go on one of those great white watches off the coast of Africa or Australia, in a diving cage with those big beasts so close I could touch them.
I dream of it, frequently. Silent underwater, sharks all around. I always wake up with my heart pounding and my breath caught in my throat, fear bubbling up through my lungs. But it's exhilarating on a primordial level, to dream of the flash of teeth.
Last year, Miss Robin and Saint Rick took me to the Camden aquarium. And I spent the bulk of our trip with my hands pressed up against the glass of this one enormous exhibit full of sharks (I forget which kind, they were big son of a bitches, though). My face so close to the cool, dim glass that what's inside was all I could see. Eyes wide and entire body trembling as they swam up close before turning away.
There's nothing quite like the feeling of watching one of them slowly come right at you and completely forgetting there's a barrier of safety.
Excuse me, alledged shark attack.
It's amusing how NJ officials are refusing to state what happened. I saw the photos of the bite and it certainly looked like a shark attack to me.
The teenager who was bitten got off easy, as well. They're saying that it was possibly a small great white and he came out of this with fifty or sixty stitches. Psshaw. Child's play. He's lucky to be alive, let alone still have all his limbs.
We haven't had an attack off our coast since 1975, which has always astounded me. There's a lot of sharks in these waters. Mako and great whites, even. And it's always been a point of interest for me, that they never attacked anyone. Until now, that is.
At least there hasn't been any huge outcry of Let's go kill 'em! Far too often that is the reaction of locals when a shark does what it is meant to do: hunt and eat.
In my reading about this incident, I came across some information that an aquarium in California recently had a great white being held in capitivity. For 198 days, I believe, which is a record. Before that, I think they were only able to keep one for about sixty days before it went tits up. This one, a female, ate heartily while there, grew about a foot and gained something like a hundred pounds. They released it, with a transmitter attached, after she killed two other sharks in the aquarium and began exhibiting hunting behaviour towards the other fish.
God bless her. I hope she lives for many more decades, safe from human meddling.
I love sharks, in case that isn't obvious. The great whites, most of all. One of my biggest dreams is to go on one of those great white watches off the coast of Africa or Australia, in a diving cage with those big beasts so close I could touch them.
I dream of it, frequently. Silent underwater, sharks all around. I always wake up with my heart pounding and my breath caught in my throat, fear bubbling up through my lungs. But it's exhilarating on a primordial level, to dream of the flash of teeth.
Last year, Miss Robin and Saint Rick took me to the Camden aquarium. And I spent the bulk of our trip with my hands pressed up against the glass of this one enormous exhibit full of sharks (I forget which kind, they were big son of a bitches, though). My face so close to the cool, dim glass that what's inside was all I could see. Eyes wide and entire body trembling as they swam up close before turning away.
There's nothing quite like the feeling of watching one of them slowly come right at you and completely forgetting there's a barrier of safety.