In the Water, There’s No Attacks-Exempt Status

Recent shark attacks at San Onofre and Ano Nuevo in Northern California have given most surfers--including me--goose bumps.

A snorkeler’s leg was bitten during the weekend by a six-foot Mako about 100 feet off the surfline near San Onofre. After the shark took a small bite from John Mark Regan, it took off.

Up north near Ano Nuevo Island, off the San Mateo coast, a great white sank its teeth into Ken Kelton’s kayak Nov. 14 as he paddled around south of San Francisco. He was unhurt but badly shaken.

In news interviews, Kelton said the shark lifted almost a third of its body out of water. Teeth marks from one of the men in the gray flannel suits (a term that Fig respectfully uses when talking about the beasts) were 16 inches across.

Fig is so cool, he takes this stuff in stride. Well, like the guy should know better, he said. That whole area is prime breeding ground for the great white. If you ask me, he’s askin’ for it.

The subject gives me the willies. I still remember the dark dorsal fin I saw in Mexican waters that made me catch my breath. No dolphin. It was a quick view of that fin that immediately cut beneath the water while I wasted no time cutting toward the beach.

Fig said his Hawaiian friends have been burning up ocean telephone cables talking about attacks by tiger sharks there.

The attacks, including one two weeks ago that left an 18-year-old bodyboarder dead on Oahu’s leeward coast, prompted fishermen to sea with baited hooks to catch the gray suits.

Recent attacks in Hawaii have included:

- A year ago, a Maui woman was killed by a tiger shark while swimming within 100 yards of her waterfront home.

- Fig’s friends say that last month a 26-year-old carpenter fought off a shark that tore a chunk from his fiberglass surfboard.

- Aaron Romento, 18, the bodyboarder at Oahu, wasn’t so lucky. He managed to paddle to shore on his bodyboard after the Nov. 5 attack but bled to death from a deep gash on his leg. Fishermen quickly caught three tiger sharks, two nine-footers and one 13-footer. But they couldn’t link the sharks to the attack based on autopsy findings.

I remember the time a whole bunch of sharks were running right through the surf line during a contest in Florida at Sebastian Inlet. I was announcing the contest, and people were jumping out of the water. You could see waves breaking, and the sharks were IN THE WAVES chasing mullets right onto the sand almost.

They swam right to the inlet. They came right down the beach, went around the jetty and then they were gone. All within an hour!

As officials stopped the contest, Fig warned swimmers. Meanwhile, it seemed like the whole Atlantic got churned up.

It was a frenzy. Water was boiling all around. Fins were going through waves. Fish were trying to get out of the way. I’ve never seen anything like that before.

We got philosophic and talked about shark control. Should hunters fish man-eaters after an attack? I said I thought they should--recalling that Hawaiian fish and game officers immediately set hooks on the theory that the same shark can return for a second feeding.

Actually, I like sharks. When you’re jumping into the ocean, you’re jumping into their world, you know? So who’s to say you have the right? Fig is for using caution and for fishing the sharks out of areas where attacks have been reported. But I’m against trapping the shark in nets and killing them needlessly.

Then Fig laid a Figism on us: With your legs hangin’ down, and it’s lookin’ like a piece of bacon, well, hey, why not? That’s plenty tempting to the man in the gray flannel suit.

Shark sightings in Florida are almost common because of the warm water and plentiful fish, Fig says. Same is true in Hawaii, where some believe the sea turtle population off Oahu has attracted sharks closer to shore.

In San Francisco, my friend John Parmenter was surfing in a contest at Ocean Beach. He was the first one out on a heat and saw a huge shark swimming through a wave as it broke! He just put his stomach on the board and came in on the prone position.

Contests: Here’s results of the first event in the Hawaiian Triple Crown Series, surfed in eight- to 12-foot waves at Haleiwa in the Wyland Galleries Pro. First place went to Sunny Garcia of Hawaii, followed by Martin Potter of Great Britain, Gary Elkerton of Australia and Larry Rios of Hawaii.

Rockin’ Fig is Rick Fignetti, a surfer/shop owner. David Reyes has reported on U.S. surf teams competing in Bali and Brazil.