George Burgess: Clearly this was a banner
year for the United States in terms of numbers
of attacks.
In Hawaii it was the highest year in decades,
and in certain other areas of the world -- the
hot spots such as Western Australia and Rey/Union
-- it indicates areas that have serious problems.
We had a very, very high year in the United
States -- 53 attacks -- which contrasted with
the year before with 31 attacks, which was
quite low.
Generally in these cases when you see a rise
in the number of attacks over a couple of
year period in one geographic location, there's
usually a human induced component to that
situation that bear's addressing.
At this point, humans that are basically swapping
sharks out of their own environment are the
main motivator of shark attacks.
I would say the biggest takeaway from the
study is the underscoring of the variability
in the number of shark attacks that occurs
from year to year.
