According to National Geographic's "Animal Facts," bull sharks are among the most dangerous sharks in the world -- second only to great whites and tigers. And I am about to jump into the water with at least a dozen of them.
These fierce looking 12-footers like the kind of marine environment favored by humans: They are comfortable in coastal areas, and venture into estuaries and even upriver to fresh water. In addition to bulls, there is a tiger shark that frequents the area.
I won't be in a cage.
Diving into Shark-Infested Waters
The dive begins with a giant stride into the water, and a descent down an anchor line to an 18-inch tall "wall" of coral rock. This miniscule barrier is what separates us from the sharks.
While we are arranging ourselves behind the wall, the dive masters are busy in the "arena" where they are setting up huge plastic garbage bins filled with fish parts. Wearing chain mail gloves, and carrying long metal poles, the dive masters are somewhat protected, and can poke any sharks that get too close to the divers.
So: Feeding time. The sharks gracefully swarm around the diver masters, who hand out treats in an orderly one-at-a-time sort of way. It's nothing like a feeding frenzy, although the nurse sharks make a nuisance of themselves trying to nose their way into the buckets. Some of the sharks are close enough to touch. Which means they are close enough to touch US. We can see their teeth, and the thought passes through my mind: "Grandma, what big teeth you have!"
Safety and Shark Diving
Virtually everyone I've talked to has some fear of sharks: it seems as ingrown to us as fearing spiders, snakes, and grizzly bears. For this reason alone, there is controversy about safety. Critics sat shark diving introduces an unnatural food supply, creates aggressive behavior by clustered feeding, and habituates large and dangerous animals to humans. Regardless, here's the fact: Shark diving has been offered in Fiji for more than a decade, and there have been no injuries and no attacks.
Why? No one can say. Food that sharks prefer is abundant here, and perhaps sharks don't see scuba divers as a tasty meal. But even beyond that, the sharks appear peaceful and unconcerned, like this is a normal day's routine.
I can't count the bull sharks: They are swirling around, disappearing into and out of the blue. Plus, there are dozens of other sharks: the tawny nurse sharks, the lemon sharks, the grays, the silver tips. Later, we'll see black-tipped and and white-tipped reef sharks. And there are thousands of reef fish, including huge schools of perfectly synchronized jacks.
A tiger shark is the ultimate sighting here, but we don't see one: She was last see here heavily pregnant, in January. Our dive master says you can't miss her: 14 feet long, with stripes, and when she shows up the bulls give way, like when the bad-ass guy in a western bursts through the saloon doors.
Shark Dive Operators in Pacific Harbour, Fiji
Two dive operators, Aquatrek and Beqa Adventure Divers, offer shark dives in Pacific Harbour. I dived with both, and their operations are similar. A typical dive follows the pattern of my first dive, with Beqa. We stayed at 30 meters for 17 minutes, then 18 meters for 15 minutes, then 10 minutes at a 5 meter safety stop. Divers sometimes worry about their air consumption, particularly at the deep depths, but all you're doing is lying on the sea floor: You won't use much air, and on our dives, everyone came to the surface with plenty to spare.
Conservation Issues in Fiji Shark Diving
Shark and reef conservation are key components of the Pacific Harbour dives. Both operations have rejuvenate reefs that were once dead, and both contribute income to local communities. Both operations frequently consult with marine biologists and conservation experts on matters of safety and responsible tourism. Over the last decade, the reef has shown consistent improvement in the number of species and the visible health of the coral.
Shark diving remains controversial. But at Pacific Harbour, the combination of an 11-year safety record, scientific study, and sustainable tourism initiatives in local communities, has created a program that has had a measured positive ecological impact on the reefs and offers a lifetime highlight for shark-loving scuba divers.
Karen Berger - Karen Berger is the author of 15 books. Please click on her name to read her full bio.
