spoke too soon: 3rd victim, James Park, 30, was killed 1:30 pm today after being thrown from rowboat. police closed all beaches
two boys with cardboard shark fins do laps at local beach and cause utter panic for sunbathers #toosoon
The shark that was blamed for the death of two young people was killed yesterday by a local fisherman.
Chrissie Watson, 17, of Amity was found dead on the beach Monday morning after being mauled by the shark. That same day, Alex Kintner, 10, of Amity was swimming at Village Beach when he was violently pulled under off his inflatable raft and killed, also by the same shark.
An older man with overgrown grey sideburns and a mustache, Ben Quint was eating potato chips at the town meeting on Monday night when he originally volunteered to catch the shark. Quint slayed the shark one mile south-southwest of Amity from his boat. Quint will receive a $3,000 reward for his brave efforts.
After Quint brought the shark ashore, Matt Hooper, a marine biologist from Woods Hole, Mass., Oceanographic Institute inspected it. Hooper decided that it was a nurse shark. Nurse sharks are among the most brutal and dangerous of all sharks and have been responsible for hundreds of swimmers’ deaths along the East Coast of the United States.
The Amity Police Chief Martin Brody released a statement this morning confirming that the waters were safe once again in the town of Amity. The beaches have been reopened immediately just in time for the flood of visitors for the Fourth of July weekend.
Brody wants to remind everyone that there will be shark spotters from the Coast Guard, the Marine Patrol, the Massachusetts State Police, the U.S. Navy, Homeland Security, the FBI and numerous municipal and county police agencies in the area. This is just a precaution, and "islanders and guests should not be alarmed," Brody said.
Recent shark attacks in Cape Cod have caused swimming anxiety up and down the coast of New England. Although it seems unlikely that the crowded beaches on the 18-mile coastline of New Hampshire could be in danger, sharks are more common in this area than one might think.
The chilly water temperature of NH seems like an unappealing habitat for a shark, however that isn’t true. Just this past July, Wallis Sands State Beach closed for two days after a lifeguard spotted two 6-foot sharks. No one was injured, and despite the sighting, there have been no shark attacks since 1936.
Lobsterman and self-described shark expert Brad Laslett said that he has seen his “fair share of sharks” while out fishing. “They’re really not going to do anything,” Laslett said. “In fact, most of the time around here it’s a Basking or a Blue shark and they barely even eat fish.”
A Basking Shark is a docile, large fish that feeds only on plankton. They range from 20 to 26 feet in length and are often seem swimming in the area. The Blue Shark is the most commonly spotted shark on the seacoast of NH. They are six to 10 feet in length. Blue Sharks diet typically consist of invertebrates.
Great White Sharks are one of the three species of sharks that are universally dangerous to people. They are the only type of shark that ever come within a few hundred mile vicinity of NH. Even that is unlikely for several reasons. This is because, said Tony LaCasse, spokesperson for the New England Aquarium, Great Whites primarily eat seals, and the seal population north of Cape Cod is sparse. Additionally, the ocean floor off the coast of New Hampshire is rocky, making for tough swimming and hunting for a shark.
In short, the likelihood of kids boogie-boarding at Hampton Beach getting napped up by the next Jaws is slim.
