WA locals warned against 'vigilante-style' attacks on great white sharks
Frustrated WA surfers and fishermen are being warned not to take the law into their own hands and hunt great white sharks.
With more and more white pointers being sighted around Esperance in recent weeks, 7 News has been told frustrated locals have started to bait and kill them in a bid to protect their beaches.
WA Fisheries Minister Dave Kelly said he was open to discussing bans or restrictions on the type of bait being used near popular surfing or swimming spots but conceded there's no "complete silver bullet" to stopping shark attacks.
“There’ll always be an element of risk when you go into the ocean whether it be from sharks or drownings or from bad weather or whatever," he told 7 News.
“But as a government we absolutely take this seriously.”
The last fatal attack occured in April when 17-year-old Laeticia Brouwer was killed, but local residents say they've had enough.
Esperance Ocean Safety and Support Group leader Mitch Capelli says he is trying to work constructively with Mr Kelly on shark attack mitigation in the area.
“It’s severely hectic down here and someone is going to die and that’s the unfortunate reality of it,” Mr Capelli says
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Local fishermen who claimed they recently hooked a 3.5m great white shark that became aggressive later admitted that it was the wrong thing to do.
They say it had been filmed on three different days biting and bumping boats in Esperance, on the south coast of Western Australia.
Mr Kelly added that the installation of two $100,000 VR4 receivers in June that can detect tagged sharks was a “valued level of protection”.
However, locals say that the receivers do not help protect the beaches as nearly all of the sharks spotted aren't tagged.
