Drones are detecting more sharks at US beaches but do they make public safer? | Sharks

toAlthough investment in drones to monitor sharks has recently increased in states such as New York, the machines’ use as a public safety tool is limited and there is no evidence that the threat sharks pose to swimmers is increasing, experts say.

But there are more reports of sharks around local beaches.

Observers warn that this increase may be due to more machines now roaming the water looking for sharks, and the number of sharks swimming closer to shore is increasing. Experts say this perceived increase could lead to irrational reactions from government officials and beachgoers, especially since shark attacks are so rare.

The end result could be a spiral: Governments get more reports of shark sightings, so they buy more drones, which detect more sharks.

“The reality is that the number of sharks may not have increased, but the fear factor certainly may have increased,” said Greg Skomal, senior fisheries scientist for the Massachusetts department of marine fisheries.

The chance of being bitten by a shark is one in 4.3 million. Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. There will be 65 unprovoked shark bites worldwide in 2025; This number was below the last 10-year average of 72. Florida Museum of Natural History reported.

Even though sharks don’t pose a greater threat, New York state continues to spend more money monitoring them. Governor Kathy Hochul announced that the state will increase its lifeguard staff by 25% in 2022. through overtime and purchase additional drones to monitor the ocean. The following year, on Shark Awareness Day, he announced that the state would: spend $1 million buy drones and train staff to use them. The state later deployed 60 drones.

This year, the state spent $322,000 to buy 16 more drones to monitor sharks, according to the New York state office of parks, recreation and historic preservation. (A spokesperson did not answer whether this was in addition to or part of the previous $1 million pledge.)

“We will benefit from the power of technology” [and] “We value the human capital of our lifeguards and make sure we do everything we can to literally take the pain out of future shark encounters,” Hochul said in 2023.

In Australia, the New South Wales government also recently announced a $34 million initiative to expand shark monitoring activities.

Drones are effective at detecting sharks at the surface, are cheap, easy to use and can cover a lot of ground, says Chris Lowe, director of the Shark Laboratory at California State University, Long Beach.

“The problem is, if visibility is bad, a shark can literally be five feet below the surface and you can’t see them,” Lowe said, noting that in addition to drones, lab staff tag sharks and place acoustic sensors on beaches.

“When a tagged shark approaches within approximately 300 or 400 meters of one of the underwater receivers, the receiver will record the time, date and identity of the shark,” Lowe said.

The laboratory shares this information with local authorities.

“We always tell lifeguards that this is not an early warning system, this is a science tool,” Lowe said. If people decide not to visit a beach because of shark reports, “If the goal is just to set up surveillance and then get people out of the water, you can do that, but it may be unnecessary and there may be other consequences, such as economic consequences.”

Lowe emphasized that his team had “never seen any footage in thousands of flights that showed a shark acting aggressively towards a person.”

More great white sharks have recently appeared around Wellfleet, Massachusetts, due to an increase in the population of seals they eat. In 2018, a man died after being attacked by a shark near Wellfleet. The town then got receivers to spot the tagged sharks and purchased a pair of drones for $6,000.

Suzanne Grout Thomas, Wellfleet’s retired community services manager, said drones only work “if the water is crystal clear, which is not the norm.” He also doesn’t think sharks necessarily pose a greater threat. They are intelligent and “don’t want to eat people; they really want seals and are learning to tell them apart”.

Skomal noted that drones can provide the public with a false sense of security, especially since they cannot detect all sharks, adding: “I think that’s why many municipalities haven’t invested in drones.”

If any staff at New York state beaches see a drone-carrying shark, lifeguards always clear the water, said George Gorman, regional director of the state parks office. The government does not use tags and sensors to detect sharks.

“If they see anything worrisome, namely a large school [baitfish] or bunker fish, that’s a red flag for us,” because sharks love those fish, Gorman said. “Then they watch that area more intensely.”

The state didn’t clean up the water in the parks this year until someone was bitten on the foot at Jones Beach on July 3. That person was taken to hospital non-life-threatening injuries. Gorman pointed out that this was just a suspicious shark bite and that the swimmer did not see the animal.

At nongovernment-run New York City beaches, police are deploying two-man teams to four beaches to conduct drone flights to look for “distressed swimmers, sharks and other unusual sightings,” according to a spokesman.

“If one of our pilots detects a shark or dangerous marine life, we notify the parks department and New York City emergency management. The parks department will make the final decision on beach closures,” the spokesperson stated in an email.

A parks department spokesperson stated that if aerial surveillance confirms shark sightings, the department will close the beach for one mile in each direction for at least one hour or until sharks are confirmed free.

This year, shark sightings have led the department to close beaches in the Rockaways in Queens 23 times since late May. Gothamist reported this week.

There had been only 11 closings at that point last year. And in 2024, there were only 11 for the entire year.

When deciding whether to close a beach, officials need to do so carefully, Lowe said. “Otherwise you end up with a situation where people are afraid to go into the water.”