Featured Image Credit: Victor Bergmann via Flickr
By: Sarah Sharkey
Hunter Treschl and Paul de Gelder are brave souls. They had previously been harmed in a shark encounter that resulted in the loss of one of their limbs. But neither of these men are letting their past dictate their future.
Photo Credit: ABC News
They have decided to hop back in the water with sharks and enjoy the ocean once again.These men realize that what happened to them was not an extreme act of hunting, but rather more like an accident.
So they went back into the ocean to take a closer look at the magnificent creatures that sharks are. These survivors went cage diving with sharks in the Bahamas as part of a “Shark Week’ documentary in order to face their fears and raise awareness for shark appreciation.
They were completely safe inside of the cage, but even getting close to these animals can be terrifying – especially after experiencing a distressing event, like a shark encounter.
It was a bit kind of scary at first, I mean as you would expect, but that was like maybe the first two or three minutes and after that I really began to appreciate like, wow, these are some really cool animals and getting to see them up close is really awesome, said Treschl of the experience.
Photo Credit: Jeffrey Langlois/Palm Beach Daily News
Amazingly, the survivors call the incidents that took their limbs “shark encounters” and not “shark attacks.” This is because they believe that the shark that bit them was not at fault, and it was purely a matter of coincidence.
They use this phrasing to combat the aggressive image of sharks that the media has portrayed over the years. Contrary to popular belief, most shark bites are not the result of a shark seeking out a human as prey, but more often a case of mistaken identity in the murky waters that sharks call home.
Always remember to take precautions when swimming in the ocean to avoid an unfortunate shark encounter. The simplest thing to do is avoid swimming at dusk or dawn. This may seem inconvenient, but the ocean is the home of sharks. As humans, we need to respectful of their natural domain.