Quote:
Originally Posted by Dail14
There are not many if any recorded bites from Makos not including those of people who bring them aboard a boat.
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I read somewhere that there were something like forty Mako attacks in the last few decades and some of them involved fatalities, but about half of those were cases where the shark attacked the boat.
Whites and Tigers attack more people because they hunt in the shallows where people swim. Adult Mako's are opportunistic apex predators that eat large prey. They will kill swordfish almost their size and have no problem killing seals, and even Dolphins. I saw one kill a 250+ pound sword off the west end of Catalina, just came up and ripped it's tail off. I'm sure they would have no problems with killing people. The deal is there's not a ton of big ones around close to shore, and people rarely swim offshore where they feed.
What most people don't know is that large Makos are historically known for attacking boats, much more so then any other shark. They've been known to come up unprovoked and grab outboards of moving skiffs, sometimes destroying the transom or motor. I knew an old timer from Redondo that had one attack his boat three times each time killing the motor. Every time he'd fire it back up that shark would attack again. Finally he just quit trying and waited it out. Said it was a big Male Mako maybe 800 pounds and that the whole thing scared the hell out of him. This guy was a long time commercial fisherman and I certainly believed him.
Though I'm sure the California inshore attacks against surfers historically where white sharks, I'm starting to think that some of the White Shark sitings offshore are possibly big makos. The deal is most people don't know enough about them to tell them apart. I've seen vids where people have dove and even swam with Great Whites. Whites are much more selective about what they feed upon, and have even been known to leave surfers after an initial attack. I can't see a Mako doing that, once they want to feed on something they mortally wound it then stick around till it's done. I doubt your ever going to see a video with a diver swimming with a 1000 pound Mako. I sure as hell wouldn't do it. You can get away with that with little makos, but anyone who tries it with an adult in my opinion absolutely insane.