A teenage girl in Australia on a jet ski decided to jump into the water, allegedly to swim with dolphins, when she was mauled and killed by a shark.
The 16-year-old suffered severe injuries in Swan River in Perth.
The Acting Police Inspector, Paul Robinson, spoke to news media and said that the girl probably spotted a pod of dolphins near where they were jet skiing. The friends she was with didn’t get off their jet skis.
According to wildlife officials, the Swan River, which connects to the Indian Ocean, does not have a huge presence of sharks, and a shark sighting and subsequent killing is rare in the area.
Local media reports speculate that the attack could have been committed by a bull shark, usually found in Australian rivers.
Interviewed by CNN, Andrew Chin, a James Cook University senior research fellow, said that even though the attack was rare, it was not the only one.
Chin said the river estuary is a popular habitat for bull sharks, and people should be careful because they can come into close contact with sharks. He warned the public to follow the shark safety advice from local authorities.
The last fatal shark attack in Perth’s Swan River was more than a year ago, in November 2021, when a bull shark attacked a 50-year-old local man. Witnesses pulled him from the river and tried to stop the bleeding from his leg, but he later died.
Officer Robinson said that although bull sharks are aggressive sometimes, experts continue to reiterate that shark attacks are rare events in the Swan River area, and people should be cautious but shouldn’t panic.
Chin said that, unfortunately, like all shark encounters, bull shark attacks can end in tragedy.
