For the first time in more than 20 years, there has been a confirmed sighting of a great white shark off of Woods Hole.
Margaret Bowles and Maddie Cronin were paddleboarding and taking photos off of Stoney Beach on the 4th of July when Bowles noticed an alarming dorsal fin.
“And I was like, ‘Oh my goodness, that's a shark. We need to leave now,’” Bowles said. “We paddled away as fast as we could, but fortunately, it all worked out and the shark did not give chase.”
When the two made it safely to shore, they realized the dorsal fin had made it into one of their photos.
“We thought, there’s no way this is a great white shark,” Bowles said. “And if it is, it's a juvenile or something.”
They sent the photo off to shark experts for help with identification, including Greg Skomal, a shark biologist with the state Division of Marine Fisheries.
Skomal told CAI he was able to identify the fin as belonging to a great white shark by its size in comparison to Bowles and her paddleboard, as well as its shape and color.
Bowles said she has been spending summers in Woods Hole since she was little. The last time there was a confirmed shark sighting in the area was 2004, which Bowles pointed out, was before she was born.
“I always operated under the assumption that there were no sharks in Woods Hole,” she said. “I would have friends down and they'd ask, ‘Are there sharks here?’ And I'd be like, ‘No, no way.’”
On Cape Cod, the conventional wisdom is that great white sharks tend to spend most of their time on the Outer Cape, where food is abundant in the form of seals.
“The general perception that white sharks are predominantly along the Outer Cape is actually quite true based on the data we've collected,” Skomal said. “But that’s not to say that sharks don't move to other parts of Massachusetts, and we've been able to demonstrate that occasionally they do enter Buzzards Bay.”
Great white sharks are most likely to be in Buzzards Bay at the beginning and end of peak great white shark season, which is from August to October, Skomal said. But when they are in the area, they are typically just passing through on their way to the Outer Cape.
Not only is it rare to see a great white shark in Buzzards Bay, but it is also highly unlikely that a great white would try to harm a human in an encounter like the one Bowles and Cronin had, Skomal said.
“The best approach is that if you see a shark, don't panic. The probability of being bitten is very, very low,” he said. “Nonetheless, if you're concerned about your safety, just move away calmly and avoid interacting with the shark in any way.”
Bowles said that when she and Cronin got back to shore, there were no lifeguards on duty, so they reported their sighting to the police non-emergency phone number and the Sharktivity app, which is operated by the Atlantic Great White Shark Conservancy.
