Bahamas’ Shark Mauls a Diver’s Arm in Chumming Area

A diver in Grand Bahama almost had his arm bitten off by a shark after another boat began dumping chum into the water.

Rescue workers received a distress call from crew onboard the Lady Joe around noon on July 12. According to reports, the victim was diving from the Lady Joe at Shark Junction, a spot near Our Lucaya hotel that is designated for shark feedings, when a glass-bottom boat came over them. Reportedly, it was the Ocean View, run by Lucaya Watersports out of the the Flamingo Bay Hotel Marina. Although the Lady Joe crew had the proper dive flag erected, it was reported that Ocean View, did not heed the flag or the crew's verbal warnings. The boat's crew then threw blood and fish guts into the water, and a diver finning below was bitten by one of the sharks, leaving his arm nearly severed. He was stabilized and taken to a hospital by ambulance.

Ten years ago, Krishna Thompson, a Wall Street banker, lost part of his leg in a shark attack near Our Lucaya Hotel and sued for $25 million, which was later settled. Shark feeding was temporarily stopped. At that time, an industry insider told us that "Once Johnny Cochran got hold of the case, it was on NBC Dateline and the victim said -- to an international audience -- that if he had known they were feeding sharks right off the beach he would not have gone in the water. The Bahamas government has a halfbillion dollar investment in that resort, and I suspect they laid down the (as yet unwritten) law to the shark feeders who were, after all, American-owned and -run businesses."

Once again, as we have seen many times over, where sharks that normally don't attack people are fed to entertain tourists, humans become fair game.