Cape Cod - Shark Attack Mitigation Alternatives!

And I cite - emphasis is mine.

Personal Shark Deterrents

A growing number of personal shark deterrent devices are commercially available. 
Some are intended to be worn while others are to be attached to surfboards or similar equipment . The deterrents fall into two main categories: electromagnetic (EM) devices and camouflage. 
The EM devices include active (battery powered) and passive (permanent magnet) types that are either worn or are attached to surfboards. Camouflaging patterns are either wearable (wet suits) or applied to surfboards (decals, paint).

EM shark deterrent devices are all based on the same general principal, but they are not equally effective. “Sort of works” versus “doesn’t work at all” are both real possibilities and independent evaluations and comparisons of EM devices that are superficially similar are important...

The evidence for the efficacy of camouflage, whether worn or applied to a surfboard, is limited and inconclusive. We note that claims for camouflage tend towards statements that the swimmer or surfer is less likely to be noticed by a curious shark that just happens to be swimming in the area. This as opposed to statements that the camouflage will prevent the attack of a shark that is actively hunting for a meal.

The existing research suggests that some of these devices may be somewhat effective some of the time....We would always keep in mind that none of these devices provide anywhere near 100% protection under any realistic circumstances.
Finally, from a large shark already on an attack trajectory, arguably none of these devices will provide any meaningful protection at all. 

Indeed.

In brief and with the exception of the Shark Shield some of the time, those Shark repellent gizmos and those ludicrous wetsuits etc are all bullshit, cold-hearted scams and profiteering by unscrupulous con artists - re-read this and this!

And did I just hear, Clever Buoy?

Of the shark detections reported by CB, only ~40% appeared to actually be sharks, while ~60% were other objects, most commonly the baited video stations, which were stationary, or schools of smaller fish, which were moving. Of particular note, when, according to the video record, sharks were present, CB accurately detected them only ~40% of the time and failed to detect them ~60% of the time.... 
Additionally, lifeguard divers swimming in the CB array to clean biofouling off the sonar transducers were continuously tracked and continuously identified throughout the dive as large sharks. Such misidentification might apply to swimmers or seals, clearing the water unnecessarily....

Unfortunately, the documented performance does not remotely approach the promise of the system.
This creates a danger that swimmers and surfers in the vicinity of a system will relax their vigilance and fail to consistently follow safe practices, assuming that this system is protecting them to a far greater extent than it does. It should also be recognized that, even if the system does provide an accurate warning, the shark is already very close to the beach...

Yeah totally not surprised!

And the list goes on and on and on - with the fake kelp being one of the better, albeit prohibitively expensive notable exceptions!
Maybe, sometimes, somewhere! :)

But look for yourselves.

This compendium by Woods Hole is the latest and greatest synopsis of possible Shark Attack mitigation measures, notabene with special emphasis on trying to minimize bites by the resurgent GWS' population on the US east Coast in general and Cape Cod in particular. I must say that I'm seriously impressed - with some notable omissions: where are the wooden spoon and the red broom?

Synopses e.g. here and here, great app here.

Anyway.

As Tashi Blue astutely observes, considering that there are next to no attacks there, it all seems much ado about very little indeed - especially when compared to say, Hawaii, where people get munched  orders of magnitude more frequently but where nobody seems to be unduly hyperventilating much.
That said, what please is  Swimming with sharks in Oʻahu, Haleʻiwa, approx 3 miles from shore?!?

Anyway, it was quite different in the past.

But of course the new attitude makes total sense.
Assuming one observes a modicum of common-sense precautions (and here - plus, don't jump on top of a hunting GWS! :) ), chances of becoming the victim of a Shark attack are really extremely small - and, if more water users get trained and carry some first aid gear, one's chances of survival are very high indeed. In fact, among the known causes of human mortality, I would not be able mention a single one that kills LESS people than Shark attacks!

But on the other side, life in general is certainly most deadly, and people entering the water must be willing to assume a modicum of risk, to wit.

No single alternative or suite of alternatives that can 100% guarantee the safety of individuals who choose to enter the water.

• Since no mitigation alternative can provide 100% safety, reducing the chances of unprovoked attacks on humans requires a strong commitment to education and outreach, which can result in the adoption of behaviors that may reduce the risk of an unprovoked shark-human interaction.


• If water activities are avoided, the risk of attack is effectively eliminated.


• If water activities are not avoided and best management practices and Shark Smart Behaviors are widely adopted, the risk of attack may be reduced, but not eliminated.


• All individuals choosing to engage in water activities should think carefully about the level of risk associated with their preferred activity, and be comfortable with that level of risk before choosing to enter the water.


• The decision to enter the water and assume the risk of shark-human interaction is made at the sole discretion of the individual. 

In diesem Sinne.

Enjoy the Ocean - responsibly!

PS - nice - and so true, too!
PPS - good reading!
  

And here comes Kara!

Well well - what can I say.

From this lab.

Who are doing this (= milking the Shark cull?) and especially, who are lending academic gravitas to this shit - but having said that, so is Ryan Kempster for whom I have a lot of respect!

Tricky tricky!

So far, undecided!

Shark Repellents - the Bible!

Shark repelling Batspray in action!
 

Wow.

Talk about a monumental tour de force!

If you ever want to talk about Shark senses and Shark repellents with any degree of competence, you must get your hands on this simply epic treatise on the topic!

Very impressed!

No I'm not gonna try and write a synopsis.

It's simply too monumental, complex and exhaustive - and when it comes to the finer details, I'm also too stupid!

Just this.

I really had to laugh out loudly when reading the following.

Taking a different approach based on his experiences diving in the western Pacific, marine biologist Walter Starck developed a black-and-white banded wetsuit that was intended to mimic the banded poisonous sea snakes that many sharks appeared to avoid eating (Doak 1974; Nelson 1983).

Whilst T. obesus appeared to be unaffected by the banded wetsuit, it was reported to have a repellent effect on C. amblyrhynchos, C. galapagensis, and silvertip sharks (Carcharhinus albimarginatus Rüppell, 1837). Doubt was cast on the effectiveness of the banded suit based on testing performed in the Marshall Islands in the northern Pacific Ocean, but these negative results might have been because the test sites were not inhabited by sea snakes, and local shark populations may not have had the opportunity to learn to avoid them (Nelson 1983). 

This controversy also serves to highlight the difficulties in assessing repellence when complex multi-sensorial cues are available and the problems inherent in testing shark repellents when sharks must be induced (with food) to interact with them. The repellent effects of some devices may be subtle and provide a useful level of protection against unprovoked bites under normal conditions, but may be significantly reduced when sharks are provoked into feeding, especially when in groups (Gilbert 1962).

Bingo!

Remember this utter nonsense?

Even if we choose to forget the WA Tiger Sharks that target Sea Snakes, and Marine Dynamics' zebra decoy - how many Banded Sea Kraits does a GWS typically encounter in his lifetime?

And the funny disquieting part?

Hart and Collin are the very researchers that are lending scientific credibility to that whole Aussie wetsuit scam where the marketing team has even got the audacity to go and praise themselves on self-congratulatory and eminently deceiving TED talks! 

So what is this. 

Honesty in peer-reviewed articles - but then, aiding and abetting the brazen profiteering?
May this be a case of, gasp, integrity vs money?

Questions questions - but do read that article!

Helen about preventing Shark Strikes!

Source.

Have you seen this?

Shocking!

To be mentioned in the same article as those preposterous (bravo Megalobomb!) Shark repellent wetsuits is the peak of ignominy! But of course we are highly grateful for the plug, and for the equally honorable mention at 20:00ff in her podcast.

Thank you, very much appreciated!

But Helen has of course fallen into the usual trap.

Because with all due respect (!) for the concerned, those Shark strikes are actually totally irrelevant.

They are so incredibly rare, and the variables influencing them, so numerous and complex that any attempts at ever fully understanding, let alone fully preventing them will always fail. With a very few notable exceptions, those poor people that got bitten and sometimes killed did nothing "wrong" besides being in the wrong place at the wrong time - and nothing we will do will ever fully eliminate that infinitesimally small risk.

Obviously there are situations where the risk can be mitigated.

Wherever adequate and possible, ocean pools and Shark exclusion nets work 100%. Some technical solutions appear promising for protecting relatively small areas. Adequate, mostly common sense behavior and risk management can reduce the number of avoidable strikes, as could e.g. seasonal avoidance or even closures of known aggregation sites, etc.

Personal protection devices, not convinced.

Be it e.g. the Shark Shield or those darn wetsuits, they are ultimately untestable and quite possibly nothing more than placebos - but herein lays the danger insofar as the perceived protection may well lead to riskier behavior by their users.

Anyway.

Ultimately, it's all much ado about nothing.

Like Branson remarks, all the noise is actually counterproductive - and many, more savvy tourist destinations have learned that hushing things up may well be the best strategy. 

Because noise or no noise, cull or no cull, stripes or no stripes - people will continue to get bitten by Sharks.

And that's perfectly normal and as such, perfectly OK.

Shark Strikes - Amateur Hour!

Source.

Oh for crying out loud - again!

And I cite.

Victoria - How do you test a shark proof wetsuit? It sounds like it could potentially be a very terrifying test. 

Nathan - Well, we have lots of PhD students who are willing to swim with these suits on (just joking!). 
Really, it is very hard, in actual fact for all shark deterrents to test these things. Limited testing can be done in the lab, but ultimately, you have to take the product out into the wild, try and induce sharks to come up and investigate. Then you have to see how effective it is. We’re at the very early stages of helping the company to test their wetsuit and it would be really nice to validate it and see if the science really works. There's likely to be no downside of the suit, but it would be really nice to know whether it decreases your chances. 

Victoria - Does that really involve putting dummies in different wet suits underwater and inducing sharks to come and investigate and see what happens? 

Nathan - Well obviously, there are ethical problems in putting either a person or even just an entire wetsuit, a mannequin in the water. So, we have to do it in a slightly more controlled way which is to use a piece of the wetsuit material, wrapped around something which doesn’t resemble a human because obviously, we have to be very careful that we don’t want to make any association between humans and food in an area where there are sharks.

Right.

So they want to test those stupid Shark repellent wetsuits on something that does NOT look like a human - and then what? Simply claim that their experiments are applicable to Shark strikes on humans as well?

Wow.

Please re-read this post.

Those various explanations about why strikes by different Sharks occur are at best plausible hypotheses and as Doc eloquently illustrates, they are essentially not testable. Shark strikes on humans can only be rigorously tested by, wait for it...,  having Sharks strike humans, and this against a control group and sufficiently often in order to have an adequate sample size allowing for statistical analysis - and this of course equally applies, mutatis mutandis, to testing those wetsuits!

Nathan is a researcher and knows that.

Or does he? From what I can see, he's essentially an animal physiologist that is now dabbling in Shark behavior - so maybe he would be well advised to refresh his knowledge by corresponding with the Grand Mufti of Sharks?

Because this is just bullshit.

We got plenty of clues as to why different Sharks strike people - but we know nothing with certainty and will have to continue speculating, and no money out of WA coffers is gonna change that anytime soon! That money would be much, much better spent on further perfecting WA's early warning system - and were Nathan not a veritable PROFESSOR, no less, I would have to scream, totally busted!

So there - no screaming!

And anyway, who am I to say! :)

Shark-proof Wetsuits - Questions by Mark Gray!

Source.

And it gets even better!

Mark is this dude.

A renown Shark photographer, he is above all a fellow Shark diving industry professional - and having discovered those Shark repellent wetsuits, he has taken on SAMS and is publicly, and doggedly asking precise questions about their, and I cite, scientifically designed and developed shark repellent wetsuit technology.

Here is the latest exchange.

I c/p it lest as so often, it gets "accidentally" deleted - much like the mentioned "other posting" that has disappeared from SAMS' FB page.

• 

  Mark Gray So you baited up two tiger sharks and they didnt bite the bucket you had your wetsuit wrapped in...........is that the science your using?

  Saturday at 4:52pm · Like
• 

  Shark Attack Mitigation Systems - SAMS Mark, our response to your other post on the site today refers. To clarify, the one minute video sets out one very short extract of a complex testing process, which has been conducted independently by University of Western Australia since January. We welcome you to investigate the science in more detail. The link to which you have responded sets out the science page at the SAMS website, and the FAQ page at http://www.sharkmitigation.com/faq.html may provide more information if you would like to check it out.

• Mark Gray So the research hasnt involved Great White Sharks? Bit irresponsible in Marketing your products and stating that they "Protect" and "hide" without testing on the major species of sharks which has cause the fatalities in Australia in recent years..........?
• 

  Shark Attack Mitigation Systems - SAMS Mark, we are trying to come up with a positive solution, based in science. Independent testing will be an ongoing process, potentially taking many years as we discover how the full range of predatory species respond and progressively refine the visual technology. All ocean users are at risk and discretion and caution is always necessary. We think people know that. We are offering information on what we have found so far scientifically, and an alternative to a black neoprene wetsuit so that ocean users can consider that option and make a choice. We are very clear that we are not offering guarantees. Who could? We invite you to also contribute positively to this page. We have responded to two of your posts already on the same theme. If you have suggestions as to how we could better inform, such as making the position clearer on our website or including more detail in our FAQ's then please let us know. We would welcome your constructive contributions.

  
  
• 

  Mark Gray Well according to your previous posting the testing program has only started in January this year with that testing program only conducted on Tiger sharks with baited drums???. Wouldnt it be wise and responsible to do further testing on different species, namely Great Whites and Bull sharks and using test subjects which honestly represent how your wetsuits present themselves to potential predator shark (ie moving dummy surfer or diver)? With all your press releases and your youtube clip you refer to your products as "Protecting" or "Hiding" from a potential shark attack and base all your supporting evidence on a test which produced very limiting results. You have entered into a full scale marketing event without doing your homework on the so call technology and the testing involved. Now if you can not answer my questions from my own experience with sharks on a regualr basis and with little common knowledge well maybe you have a take a reall good look at your product and how your market it and yourself to the community and consumers. I have asked in a previous posts questions which I and I bet alot of others out there would be asking and the last response I recieved from you was to quote "Mark, we note and respect your perspectives and views" but failed to answer the questions at hand.

• Mark Gray I accept your invitation to contribute positively to this page. What I would like to see is some more transparency to the technology, research, and what you conveyin your marketing of your products to the general public. I would like to see these 10 questions answered: 

   1. When did the in field testing start?
  2. When did your marketing campaign start?
  3. Has there been any testing of your wetsuits on Great White and Bull sharks?
  4. Has there been any other testing procedure which has not included baiting of sharks for attracting? If so what have they been?
  5. Has there been any testing which involved moving a simulated subject wearing you wetsuit through the water (both Diving and Surfing)?
  6. What in field testing program has been used to determine how Cryptic your wetsuits are? And how are the results differ with different visibility, water colour, overhead light ?
  7. Are the Cryptic dive wetsuits loose their ability to “Hide” when a scuba tank, BCD and fins are added?
  8. How does the Cryptic dive wetsuit hide the noise and sight of the bubbles of a scuba diver?
  9. Has the results of the research conducted by the WA University been published and if so which publication?
  10. Do you personally wear your SAMS wetsuit when your diving or surfing?
• 

  Shark Attack Mitigation Systems - SAMS Mark,
  
  Responding as follows:
  
  1. When did the in field testing start? January 2013 – refer previous post.
  2. When did your marketing campaign start? We have not started marketing, we did a media release to let people know what we are doing on Wednesday last week, and opened up the website for review, together with this Facebook page to encourage discussion.
  3. Has there been any testing of your wetsuits on Great White and Bull sharks? Not as yet, we have covered this in your earlier posts and elsewhere in the forum. The next set of tests are proposed to be with Great Whites.
  4. Has there been any other testing procedure which has not included baiting of sharks for attracting? If so what have they been? Not at this stage, the University of Western Australia is precluded from using humans or humanoid forms of any kind and have determined that the existing testing process is satisfactory. Baiting is a necessary practicality to get any engagement with sharks in experimental conditions.
  5. Has there been any testing which involved moving a simulated subject wearing you wetsuit through the water (both Diving and Surfing)? Not as yet.
  6. What in field testing program has been used to determine how Cryptic your wetsuits are? And how are the results differ with different visibility, water colour, overhead light ? We have responded to this question elsewhere on the site yesterday and will include in our FAQ’s at our website.
  7. Are the Cryptic dive wetsuits loose their ability to “Hide” when a scuba tank, BCD and fins are added? We have responded to this in your previous post.
  8. How does the Cryptic dive wetsuit hide the noise and sight of the bubbles of a scuba diver? Obviously it doesn’t.
  9. Has the results of the research conducted by the WA University been published and if so which publication? We have responded to this in the posts above.
  10. Do you personally wear your SAMS wetsuit when your diving or surfing? Yes.
  
  Mark, you have now posted somewhere between 20 and 30 questions to this page in the course of a couple of days, most of them repetitious. Some include personal statements that verge on troll-like behavior. We have respectfully attempted to answer them.
  
  We accept that you are not a fan of what we trying to achieve. Equally there are many people who see logic in the concept and wish to explore it further. Over the last few days, this has included previous shark attack victims making contact with us to see how they can help us in our trials.
  
  We will not be responding to any further posts from you, we hope you understand. If you continue to post in this manner we will, with regret, be obliged to exclude you from the forum.

  
  
• Mark Gray its a shame that after you have invited me for constructive contributions in a previous post your now no longer going to response to my valid questions regarding your product. I am all for trying to achieve a much safer aquatic environment for all to enjoy but I am not a fan on the ways and means in which your company has mislead the general public by telling them that you are scientifically backed, have the technology which has proven itself, hides you from the shark when diving and putting the fear of god into the genral public especially in your youtube clip stating "now the deadliest coast in the world". You have based your whole product line on unfinalised research (Results from 6 months of a 24 months research project) and on a single species of shark which is not the major cause of fatal attacks here in Australia, under different conditions which would not apply for which your products are inteded to be used for. Your Youtube clip and media releases do not included any of the cautionary comments which you have included in you website and your response to my questions above show that your more concerned about getting your product out into the public eye well before any of the scientific results and conclusions have been finalised which to me makes me believe that your company is more concerned with making a quick buck and not addressing the public saferty of water users. Lie to the genral public and you will be bitten on the arse but my concern is more for the safety of potential users of your products who have bought your product based on your mistruths and false advertising.

 Mark has summed up his conclusions as follows.

 Mark Gray From the SAMS face book page they finally answered done of my point blank questions.

1. The field testing is a 24 month on going process which started January 2014. Final results are still 18 months away.
2. The field testing is based on one species of shark (tiger) which was attracted by baits
3. The field testing has not involved Great White sharks or Bull Sharks to date
4. The field testing does not include testing similar sized subject which would represent the shape and movement of a surfer or diver. According to SAMS bait is required to attract sharks to the test subjects.
5. The cryptic dive suits are tested in clear water on a bright day not results given regarding low light, cloudy, or reduced visibility water quality.
6. Cryptic dive suits also require cryptic patterns to be also applied to scuba tanks, BCD, fins to make the wetsuit cryptic.
7. Cryptic dive wetsuits will not hide the user from the sight of their bubbles or the noise of their breathing.
8. SAMS acknowledged that GWS do attack using a breach method on silhouette prey on the surface.
9. SAMS also acknowledged that sharks also use other senses other than vision to hunt prey.

On the basis that field testing was performed by using baited drums on the test subjects of two tiger sharks in clear water in bright days with this testing only in its 6 month out of 24 set aside for a finalized conclusion makes me believe that SAMS is more interested at cashing in on the fears if the general public that spending time for proper ethical research to base their products on.

And to the Oceans Institute, this:

Sounds like your cashing in with the developers and using half truths to sell wetsuits that "Protect" and "Hide" you from all species of sharks. 

This is making your research look like as joke and is tied up with a bunch of snake oiler promising the world but delivering nothing

Bingo.

As I first mocked, and then stated: it's just total BS and shameless profiteering!

Meanwhile, in la-la land...

David has unearthed yet another priceless life saving  video by Eternal Youth Empire aka Israel-Light  - how to retard ageing by a whopping 30%!!!

And this time, it's all, gasp, for free!

Behold!

But beware!

You got to clean up the pineal gland, or it's all for naught!

Yes this is (caps lock) SCIENCE!

Exactly like her striped wetsuit - and incidentally, EXACTLY like the wetsuits by SAMS!

To be continued no doubt!

Eternal Youth Empire aka Israel-Light?

Source = 16 minutes of pseudoscientific BS!

And I cite. 

High Intensity Discharge for those who wish to Sleep in Peace is a charity organization and trusted self-help authority dedicated to helping humanity refine its collective consciousness. 

We are a group of artists / environmentalists / philosophers / humanitarians /animal loving vegetarians / scientists / attorneys / surfer mavericks with more life experiences than degrees to which we attribute our learning. Sure we have degrees and awards if that sort of thing impresses you. What impresses us is a great day surfing and coming home to our significant other. 

We are here to save lives.

Wow.

Yes this would be the scientific development team for yet another striped Banded Sea Krait (not a Sea Snake!) mimicking Shark repellent wetsuit!

Did I say, New Age?
Bingo!

And here's the verbose inventor!

Convinced?

If not, you may wanna go and read the absolutely mind-boggling debate on this post by Shark Year, including, and I cite again, tons of scientific evidence!
And should you still not be convinced , here's Veronica Gray aka scenester reciting her mantra in Louisiana - inclusive of the "dead in 8 seconds" factoid. Did you check out the link - severe envenomations can be successfully treated even 7 to 8 hours after the bite! And - remember the striped Seal decoy by Marine Dynamics!

Talk about a (banded) snake oil saleswoman on fucking steroids!

Yes it's all total BS and bunk science!

JSD's comment is spot on - it's all of that (wowza!!!), plus brazen profiteering!

And so it goes...

The anti-Shark Wetsuits - Two!

So much for zebra stripes deterring predators! Source!

OK, yesterday I had a bit of fun.

But actually, this is a serious issue.

The word that comes to mind is unconscionable.

Far from being good technology that has proven itself as stated in the promotional video and suggested by those dozens of press releases, this is yet again one of those commercial scams targeting the fear of Shark strikes - and if the testimony of Peter Moore in this thread is any indication of the anxiety pervading the surfing community in Western Australia, the brazen marketing strategy may even be successful!

I was intrigued by the comment by Marine Dynamics.

Upon asking for more details, I got this answer.

Our lucky seal decoy is made out of a Zebra striped rug (we were desperate for materials). 
Not only is it good for breaching, but even during a chum trip where the sharks have plenty of time to suss it out, they still go for Zebra!

Bingo.

The zebra suit is just bullshit, much like the camo suit that will, if at all, only work as long as its wearer will remain completely motionless and not expel any bubbles - or does anybody really believe that those Sharks are too stupid to detect a person underwater, the more as they are wonderfully equipped for finding their natural prey that is often exquisitely camouflaged?

And the science?

Like in the case of the Shark Shield, the various chemicals and those metals and magnets, I have no doubt that some positive effects have been detected in small, controlled experiments.

But to take those findings and then simply declare them relevant for the prevention of Shark strikes is at best naive and at worst, utterly ruthless and criminally negligent - the more as under certain conditions, they may sometimes even favor instead of repelling a strike, see the zebra decoy and the controversy about the Shark Shield!

We for one would never allow such a garishly striped suit on our Shark dive, ever!

Here's the catch: we'll never know one way or the other!

Like yours truly and others have said a million times, Shark strikes elude science, this because in real life, they are subject to too many variables and are simply too rare to warrant any statistical analysis, and because they cannot be properly tested via the scientific method - as in getting thousands of volunteers splish-splashing around somewhere in the presence of those large predatory Shark and then comparing the results of one variable (= e.g. the zebra wetsuit) against those of a (in this case = suicidal!) control group. 

Or would those assertive gentlemen in the video oblige and personally showcase those suits at one of the GWS aggregation sites - maybe even with the token Shark media whore filming them in slo-mo?

Long story short?

Normally I couldn't be bothered less.

There's plenty of scamsters out there, and there's equally plenty of credulous suckers eager to hand them their money - as amply proven by the stupendous size and growth of quackery and the various bizarre ramifications of the New Age movement ranging from crystal skulls all the way to Lemuria.

So if those aquatic recreationists want to fork out 500 bucks for a textile placebo, good on them - Shark strikes are so incredibly rare that wearing or not wearing those Shark repellent wetsuits will have zero effect, at least when it comes to the statistics.

That is, only if all other variables remain unchanged!

But what if those surfers and spearos were to change their behavior in response to their misguided sense of security, and engage in riskier activities as a consequence? That is definitely a possibility as amply documented by other (legit) safety devices like e.g. dive computers - and if anything should happen, does anybody believe that this meager disclaimer is gonna hold water?

We shall see shall we not!

No worries re the manufacturers.

That's clearly their assumed business risk.

But what about those researchers?

Considering the breathy marketing, the essentially untested and thus misleading scientific foundation (great formula!) and chart and especially, the brazen assurances - is that really something Professor Shaun Collin and Professor Nathan Hart and especially, the Oceans Institute at the University of Western Australia want to lend their name to, this in view of the very real risk of being held liable for any future mishaps?

Questions questions!

PS Pete Thomas here - totally forgot about the demented rash guard!

Busted - again!

Damn!

This is quickly turning into a marketing nightmare!

Turns out that those background Sharks are nothing but an optical illusion - because the latest, greatest, life-saving science teaches us that they simply cannot be there!

Watch this!

Wow - see?
Black and white stripes = no Sharks! 

Yes it's that simple!

And please, don't argue - once a veritable Professor (!) has given his seal of approval, that's the end of the discussion full stop!

And there's more!
Since those Sharks can't see from far but only perceive things in the last few seconds before the attack, it also unequivocally follows that the infamous nikitating membrane is a) either transparent or more likely, b) never existed in the first place! Elementary my dear Watson!
Ain't science a wonderful thing!

So what about those Sea Snakes.
This is obviously a bold-faced lie, and this video simply did not happen - and shame on AIMS for aiding and abetting such a shameless hoax!

Leaves this remarkable exposé.

At first glance, it comes across as a rather epic multidisciplinary tour the force that even includes cultural anthropology no less!
But beware - the guy is quite obviously nothing but a brazen liar and moocher who wants to make himself important and is angling for fame and possibly even royalty payments! In going with a remarkable, and equally frequent bonmot by one of the greatest luminaries in Shark conservation, one does not need a Ph.D. to figure that his story is just simply impossible because the Professor (!) has only made his groundbreaking scientific discovery now!
Elementary!

Long story short?

Buy that Shark repellent wetsuit as it will save your life - as unequivocally proven here!
Any GWS barreling up at 100 miles per hour because it has mistaken you for a Seal and wants to eat you only wants to give you a hug will immediately cease and desist, inches away, because it will realize that you're actually a venomous Sea Snake on a surf board!

And that's a promise!

H/T: Lindsay and especially, Johann! Merci!