Australia Working On High-Tech Shark-Detection Systems (itworld.com) 81
jfruh writes: Even if you're a frequent ocean swimmer, you're much more likely to die in a car accident than from a shark attack — and yet sharks strike fear into people's hearts in ways that directly affect the economies of surf paradises like Australia. That's why the Australian government is working on a host of techologies to detect shark incursions on popular beaches, including drones and smart buoys (PDF) that can identify potential predators (PDF).
System not required (Score:5, Funny)
You don't need a system to detect "High-Tech Sharks"...
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Not if the lasers are infra-red
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Use your cell phone camera, although finding a pocket for it at the beach can be dicey at best.
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The normal term for that storage space is NOT "pocket".
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Re:Systemd not required (Score:3)
Lasers don't kill people, sharks kill people.
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You don't need a system to detect "High-Tech Sharks"...
Do not look at laser with remaining eye.
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That won't work for the stealth sharks which remove their lasers before assaulting a beach.
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You don't need a system to detect "High-Tech Sharks"...
Yes, you should just look towards the las.... AAARGH, my eye.
Godzilla? (Score:2)
What about Godzilla? This is worth nothing if it can't detect Godzilla [wikia.com].
I'm not obsessed, whatever makes you think I'm obsessed?
Seems a bit silly (Score:3, Insightful)
What they really need is a box jellyfish detection system.
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Just stay out of the water and problem solved. What they really need is a drop bear detection system.
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The box jellyfish is much smaller and harder to detect and also inhabits coastal areas with far fewer people than sharks and in these areas jellyfish nets are setup and wearing skin protection is the norm.
There have been 3 reported fatalities from box jellyfish since 2000 in Australia, the last one 12 years ago.
There have been 5 reported fatalities from shark attacks in 2014 alone in Australia.
Swim Drive (Score:1)
Seems unlikely to be effective (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason that shark attacks are rare isn't that sharks are rare, it's that they rarely attack people. So any properly-functioning shark detector is going to be sounding the alarm multiple times per day, at least. That's not going to make people feel safer about getting into the water.
In an ideal world the solution would be education. If people understand statistics they'll realize that they should be far more afraid of the drive to the beach or of drowning while swimming or surfing than of being attacked by a shark. The risks are orders of magnitude higher... and it's not like many far more common forms of death aren't equally gruesome and painful. They just aren't as newsworthy and our cavemen brains are wired to judge probability by the frequency with which we hear a story, and how spectacular it is.
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The reason that shark attacks are rare isn't that sharks are rare, it's that they rarely attack people. So any properly-functioning shark detector is going to be sounding the alarm multiple times per day, at least. That's not going to make people feel safer about getting into the water.
In an ideal world the solution would be education. If people understand statistics they'll realize that they should be far more afraid of the drive to the beach or of drowning while swimming or surfing than of being attacked by a shark. The risks are orders of magnitude higher... and it's not like many far more common forms of death aren't equally gruesome and painful. They just aren't as newsworthy and our cavemen brains are wired to judge probability by the frequency with which we hear a story, and how spectacular it is.
The reason those arguments don't work on actual people is based around what they can control. People generally believe they are better drivers or swimmers or are at least smarter than the next guy and won't allow themselves to get into a situation that they can see coming. In those cases, they think they can control the situation.
They do not however feel the same way about a 15 foot white pointer capable of either biting them in half or swallowing them whole that may or may not be swimming unseen yards aw
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The reason those arguments don't work on actual people is based around what they can control.
Actually, I think that's just part of what makes the shark attack narrative compelling and "spectacular", to use the word I used before.
The other reason the argument from statistics fails is the same reason it fails with playing the lottery. Statistically, you shouldn't be afraid of sharks in "non-sharky" waters (you know, away from seal colonies, etc), and statistically, you shouldn't play the lottery, but you are and you do.
You do? I don't. Not unless the expected value exceeds the ticket price (which does occasionally happen in the big cumulative lotteries).
The shark defense field will serve the same purpose the TSA does today, giving people the false sense that humans have some modicum of control of the world around them.
But it won't, because in this case it will just reveal that there are more sharks out there than they realized.
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Tell you what though.... When the fin comes up near you when you are in the surf it doesn't matter how much you academically know it probably isn't interested in you it's terrifying.
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Tell you what though.... When the fin comes up near you when you are in the surf it doesn't matter how much you academically know it probably isn't interested in you it's terrifying.
I suppose. I've been swimming with sharks lots of times and didn't find it frightening, but I've always been under the water, not on the surface.
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I've never found then scary when under the water. But when you are in the surf and all you can see is a fin I have found it down right terrifying. I think it is because you can't see the whole animal. So your mind turns it into something bigger than Jaws. On top of that when you are underwater you can follow their movements, where as on the surface all you see is the fin when it breaks the surface and with any kind of waves it's when they are close. So your mind gets to run amok creating the worst poss
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I've never found then scary when under the water. But when you are in the surf and all you can see is a fin I have found it down right terrifying. I think it is because you can't see the whole animal. So your mind turns it into something bigger than Jaws.
I'm a confident swimmer so when I'm out there I duck under and have a look at the sandbars so I can pick the where the best waves are for a body bash, which is usually an advantage over the board riders who can't tell what is under them - which is what I think you mean.
You can't help looking for that dark shadow.
Once when I was out there I saw a seal, in a hurry, he swam right at me and I knew when I saw the paniced look in its eyes it was trying to escape. I got the fuck out of there immediately - swa
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I usually body board and where I am unless you were wearing goggles you can't see that far under water due to the sand and stuff being thrown up by the waves. Max 5 meters.
The closest I have ever come is sitting with a group when a decent sized fin has passed right through the middle of us. Don't know how big it was, but it wasn't a little one. We were out of there straight away.
As for them coming in to shore I have only ever seen the big ones come in chasing schools of fish. It looked very similar to t
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Also, shark attacks on humans are usually a mistake by the shark. They are either bull sharks, which just bite anything they run into, or they are tiger sharks that are munching through a school of bait fish and a human is in the way.
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So sharks with superb senses designed to hunt in cubic miles of ocean are also some how completely incapable of telling the difference between a fish and a human. Sharks attack people because they are hungry and because the senses detect people as potentially edible, nothing more and nothing less. There first try at eating humans are cautious, take a chunk see if it poisonous or dangerous and then come back to finish it off if it is safe. Humans are generally gone by then and for centuries, said shark and
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Sorry this is just plain wrong. Have a look at the bull shark for example, one of the 3 most likely sharks to bite a human. They are basically blind bottom feeders that use the bump and bite method of attack. They are common as hell in the Brisbane River and there are plenty of reports of people being bitten then released.
You seem to have thrown all sharks into the apex predator open water category of the great white and that simply isn't right.
As for successful shark attacks leaving no evidence this is
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We get the Great White up my way (off the New England coast) and they don't really even bite anyone. I'm not sure why the person above thinks sharks get killed if they bite humans. It's not like the movie Jaws where they hunt around for a specific shark or anything. There's no great throng of people with pitchforks and torches who go hunting mean sharks that bite people. They just stay the hell out of there for a few days. I also kind of doubt that sharks are telling each other, "Go for the fat ones, those
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Kinda like an asteroid detector system that doesn't plot trajectories... what they really need is mood rings for sharks, tag 'em all and when one is in a human biting mood, sound the alarm.
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The reason that shark attacks are rare isn't that sharks are rare, it's that they rarely attack people. So any properly-functioning shark detector is going to be sounding the alarm multiple times per day, at least. That's not going to make people feel safer about getting into the water.
Sharks don't rarely attack people, they rarely interact with them. Claiming overall statistics is misleading as the time spent under threat is many orders of magnitude different for a person driving to the beach for the car accident and the shark attack case. There's a reason why most shark attacks happen to surfers, and there's also a reason why most shark attacks happen to go into water. Comparatively road fatalities can happen to almost anyone.
When you consider that there's no reason not to have a shark
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So any properly-functioning shark detector is going to be sounding the alarm multiple times per day, at least. That's not going to make people feel safer about getting into the water.
I don't think the shark detector is not going to be hard wired to a WW2-era klaxxon on the beach.
This system will most likely try and reduce the need for expensive spotter planes or RIB patrols which currently do the job of the initial spotting. How that is dealt with will still be a matter for manned beach patrols
In an ideal world the solution would be education
That is happening too. The area I wakeboard on is a known Bull Shark nest, yet no-one runs out of the water screaming hysterically when a fish is sighted. Most people brought up around water here
Lawyers ... (Score:4, Insightful)
No, really, hear me out ... about a kilometer or so off shore, continuously chum the water with lawyers.
This way the sharks are always well fed, and won't come in-shore.
Of course, the animal rights groups might object that feeding the lawyers to the sharks might harm the sharks, but they'll come around.
Won't work (Score:5, Funny)
You forget the old joke:
Q: Why don't sharks bite lawyers?
A: Professional courtesy.
Finally a legitimate use for drones (Score:2)
Seems like a good candidate for drone with pattern recognition software.
I got this! (Score:2)
You know what's worse than sharks? Box jellyfish.
I figure that if a shark ever comes near me while I'm wading, I'll grab a few blueys and chuck 'em at the sharks until they go away.
Australia. Nope. (Score:5, Funny)
Sharks aren't what they should be worried about. You have to go in the water to get eaten by sharks. But death adders... no, those assholes will slither up your leg while you're waiting in line at the Hungry Jack's. And then, when you run screaming into the water to get away from the death adders, BAM! the sharks got you.
Fuck Australia. It's a shame, too, because the last time I was there I had a really good time. But the only reason I'm still alive is because having a blood alcohol level of over .25 acts as a death adder repellent. At least that's what the Qantas stewardess told me as we were landing. Thank god the airport bar was open.
And let me tell you, it's not easy maintaining a blood alcohol level of over .25 for six weeks while you're a visiting professor on a university fellowship. Fortunately, the rest of the faculty seemed to be on the same anti-death adder regimen.
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But you have to stay indoors if you are taking the alcohol repellent approach. For some reason that haze of alcohol you have sweated out makes drop bears go fucking crazy. Personally I would prefer death by red belly then drop bear.
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But indoors is where the ear wax spiders hang out.
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Don't forget the red-backs in the toilets. And the huntsmen that roam the bedrooms carrying necrotizing fasciitis.
http://www.greenlivingtips.com... [greenlivingtips.com]
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Holy hell. Is Australia the result of some lab accident gone wrong, or what?
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Holy hell. Is Australia the result of some lab accident gone wrong, or what?
The Maralinga tests outback resulted in some strange interactions with the DNA of the animals that were out there. In the cities we just dismissed some of the stories as kooky country folk, but then strange things happened in the outer suburbs. When it finally got to the cities, we knew we were in trouble and we had to desperately find somewhere these strange toxic migrants would go willingly.
Mel Gibson and Russel Crowe have been in the US for a while now and we are forever indebted to you for it.
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I guess that's OK, but you're also gonna owe us for the barbecue you stole.
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At least our possums are way cuter than yours (assuming you're a yank of course). Possums are meant to be cute and fluffy. Not what ever the fuck happened to create an opossum!!!
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True story: One summer back in high school was the first time I saw a US possum. We were out at the forest preserves and I was a little buzzed. I thought it was a mutant dog with radiation poisoning. Scared the hell out of me.
Nature really is an awful thing. Sooner we wipe it out the better.
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If you want to hear awful have a listen to 2 koalas fighting...... https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com] Skip it to about half way through and you will get the demon possession noises...
I live out on acreage and have a eucalyptus reserve running through my property. I hear this every night during spring (ie now)
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Thank you. Now I won't sleep tonight.
Oh stop it already! (Score:2)
Swim there for free beer" and "All the Pop Celebrities swim here" still work for Darwin's laws, and with the massive nanny state it's one of the last remaining refuges.
Re: Australia. Nope. (Score:2)
Is your name not Bruce, then?
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Where did this Bruce thing come from?
I remember one of my American friends being absolutely astounded that we had a 1700km long highway called the "Bruce Highway". I don't understand.
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The Bruces sketch [youtube.com].
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WTF how have I not seen this! :-)
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I know it was meant to be a silly post above, but we do have enough snakes that even those i
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When I was in Australia last, I saw death adders everywhere, but my effort to maintain a .25 blood alcohol level might have had something to do with that. I mean, I saw yowie and drop bears, too. In fact, I think I may have brought a drunk yowie back to my hotel room.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yowie_%28chocolate%29
They were a good replacement for easter eggs and I've used many of the plastic animals inside as gaming figures.
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Like playing Russian Roulette is safer than going to bed. Far more people die in bed.
plot for Sharknado 4 (Score:2)
Start the movie off with them rolling out this new system.
low tech sometimes best . . . (Score:2)
There's no need for high tech detectors. The best method is to throw in some bait to test the waters. I suggest lawyers, politicians or music industry executives.
Forget the shark... (Score:1)
a) You'll be killed on the way home by a vehicle
or
b) You'll be killed by the minefield [youtu.be]
Sharks? What sharks? (Score:2)
relevant video (Score:2)
relevant video [neatorama.com]:shark observers filming a great white shark from an inflatable pontoon boat. shark attacks and partially deflates boats. shark observers gtfo.