Return to Transcripts main page
American Morning
New Smyrna Beach Sees Nine Shark Attacks in Past Week
Aired August 27, 2001 - 10:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Count them: at least nine shark attacks last week near New Smyrna Beach, Florida. Officials are expected to decide today if it's safe to go back into the water. In the latest attack, an 18-year-old surfer was nipped on the foot on the foot and the thigh Saturday.
Our Mark Potter is on the scene this morning at the beach. And he brings us a live update -- Mark, good morning.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MARK POTTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The one mile stretch of beach where most of the bites occurred remain closed to swimmers and surfers over the weekend, although own a few sharks were spotted from the air.
Susan Sharp (ph) and her sister hoped to videotape some sharks, but didn't see a thing.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, I saw more at Sea World than we did here.
POTTER: The local beach patrol says it's hard to find a shark now, although they're certainly out there all year long.
CAPT. ROB HORSTER, VOLUSIA COUNTY BEACH PATROL: I mean, you can go down there in a specific area, if the water is right, and sure, you could probably spot one. But you're going to be there for a couple of hours looking for one, just like these people that are attempting to catch a shark; nobody's caught one all week.
PALMER: The rest of the shore at New Smyrna Beach was crowded with bathers, even though a stiff wind kicked up the waves. Many people went in the water, although some said they were more cautious now.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, and I wouldn't let my children go out there, or my grandchildren; not at all.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't know if I would dangle my feet over a surfboard.
PALMER: But surfers didn't seem to mind, and continued to ride the waves. Sharks are just part of the environment, they say. LEON JOHNSTON, SURFING ADVOCATE: We see the sharks. We run into the sharks. We land on them. We hit them. We don't jump over them, but sometimes they'll be in the water, we move out of their way.
POTTER: Local residents complain about what they see as a media feeding frenzy that briefly hurt local businesses.
CHRIS SLIZYK, BARTENDER: At first it slowed our business down, but now it brings out the curious. More people are coming out to see what's happening.
POTTER (on camera): Local surfers and beach patrol officials argue that what occurred here were not shark attacks in the intentional sense, but instead were shark bites, which were accidental.
HORSTER: The shark comes in, they bite somebody and then they swim off. It causes enough damage to do stitches; no one's ever lost their life out here.
POTTER (voice-over): But it did create lot of attention, and kept some out of the water -- but certainly not all.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
POTTER: County officials say they will decide today whether to reopen that 1 mile stretch of beach which remained closed over the weekend.
They sent a helicopter up a short while ago to see if there are any sharks in the water. And they will take into consideration the fact that yesterday remained calm. There were no reported incidents in the water.
Now, to review the numbers: nine shark bites in the Volusia County over the last week or so; eight of them here in the New Smyrna Beach area; 19 so far this year in this county -- that's one more than all of last year in Volusia County. And the people here say that they are used to dealing with sharks, that this is not an uncommon event. And they want to point out that these are shark bites, not shark attacks.
That's a point that they say over and over again. These are fish that are feeding on other fish, and the surfers get in the way, and they get bitten one time. And nobody has been killed here in a shark attack since 1961. And that's the only time that there has been a recorded shark death in Volusia County -- Leon, back to you.
HARRIS: All right, thanks Mark -- although there's not much difference to guys getting nibbled between a shark attack and a shark bite.
All right, thanks, Mark. We'll talk to you later.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
