Although fatal shark attacks are rare, a silvertip mother will attack a human visciously if she feels they are threatening her litter, which will stay in their mother's territory until they are half-a-year old, or herself. If a human approaches a lone silvertip too quickly, the shark will become stressed and may attack. As of 2008, four provoked, and none unprovoked, silvertip attacks on humans have been confirmed-none of which were fatal-each was registered by the International Shark Attack File.
A silvertip shark can be recognised by its distinctive silver dorsal fin tip. It is important for divers to register this when diving near one of these sharks-all but one of the attacks mentioned above were caused by the diver approaching a small silvertip under the impression it was a sluggish, harmless whitetip reef shark- the tail tips also have the silver markings.
A silvertip shark, warily guarding its territory from competitors. |