Diver's 'heartbreaking' encounter with shark injured by common beach toy
The diver said she was 'heartbroken' knowing there was nothing she could do to help the shark.
A diver is "heartbroken" after finding a young shark struggling to swim due to a frisbee stuck around its body, forcing it to rely only on its tail as the beach toy slowly digs further into its skin inflicting wounds.
Last week Amelie Chipeauxwas was diving 45 minutes off the coast from Seal Rocks in NSW when she noticed a grey nurse shark "wasn't swimming right" and quickly got her camera out to record it passing by.
"I just saw the big ring and I couldn't believe it. I didn't know what to do to be honest. As soon as she saw us she just swam away pretty quickly," she told Yahoo News. The almost two-metre female shark had a deep laceration on its head where the frisbee had ground down its skin and pushed into its body, with the toy also catching the shark's two pectoral fins, leaving them stuck and unable to move.
"You can see in the video the two pectoral fins stuck in the ring and it's actually starting to rip one of the fins off because she keeps trying to move," Chipeauxwas said.
"If I couldn't use my two arms it's going to make life a bit hard too."
Grey nurse sharks critically endangered in NSW
The population of grey nurse sharks have been "suppressed" in the state for several years now and the latest population record in the Mid North Coast, carried out by ecologist Dr Keith Bishop, noted only three of the species.
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Plastics in the oceans pose a huge threat to the species, and the heightened appetite for social media content with the creatures is also considered to be a factor the species have to contend with.
Bishop called the latest sighting "bizarre" and pointed to a similar incident he had seen recently which involved a shark and a two-metre long fishing line coming out of its gills.
"This was quite distressing to see... plastics in the ocean are clearly a hazard!" he told Yahoo News.
Simple steps go long way in protecting sharks
Simple behaviours like removing plastics from the ocean when you see any and correctly disposing of waste in the appropriate bin goes a long way in removing the amount of litter in the ocean.
"We just need to be mindful of our own waste and how we dispose of our rubbish," Chipeauxwas urged. "About 70 percent of all debris ends up in the ocean's eco system... and 8.3 million tonnes of plastic are discarded in the sea yearly!"
"I was devastated. I go diving with sharks everyday, I try to educate on the fact that they're not dangerous and are very important for the ecosystem. Seeing one like that was heartbreaking," she said.
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