how to survive a shark attack, tip #6

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Divers, boating accident survivors, and surfers call it a given to find themselves being encircled by a shark. However, they call it the height of misfortune to be encircled by two sharks.

This time you have a harpoon, and only one shot. There are two sharks. Here is how you can make that one shot count.

Make sure both sharks are swimming toward you and that they are near each other. Aim for the nose of one shark. Watch the harpooned shark squirm and writhe and bleed.

Sharks include in their diet seals, dolphins, and other sharks. The unhurt shark might feed on the wounded and forget about you, leaving you free to swim away.

The prudent shark will try to secure immediate gain: it will feed on its dead companion. The more selfish shark will try to maximize overall gain: you first, then the dead shark.

Keep aiming that empty harpoon at the shark, fully knowing you are now up against a selfish gambler.

You now only have one chance to survive: steel yourself, act cocky, extend you aura of unwavering confidence until the shark feels it and decides to be prudent.

But remember, the prudent shark will try to secure immediate gain. Since you are nearer to it than the dead shark it neglected, you ARE the immediate gain.

how to survive a shark attack, tip #5

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Accounts from commercial divers point out that sharks are aware of eye contact. This explains why sharks tend to attack more from the blindside, when the victim has little chance to react defensively, than from upfront.

Divers expecting sharks are often carrying a rod or a harpoon. You have neither. But you can fool that shark into thinking you are carrying either.

Here is what you do. Make sure you are facing that shark. Stretch your right arm out and point it toward the shark. Hold your right forearm with you left hand, making sure the shark sees your left arm bent at the elbow. Point all your right hand's fingers at the shark, so that your hand's pointed tip mimics the shape of a harpoon ready to be launched.

As the shark continues to encircle you, make sure you continue to face it. If it changes direction, continue to “aim” your “harpoon” at it.

Three possibilities now emerge.

First, the shark, familiar with divers and their rods and harpoons, will flee. Second, the shark, unfamiliar with divers and their weapons, will continue to encircle you until it loses interest. Third, the shark, unfamiliar with divers and their weapons, will interpret your posture as prelude to a preemptive strike, and will lunge at you mercilessly.

Do not wish for the third possibility.

how to survive a shark attack, tip #4

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Most sharks that attack people are of the "bite-and-run" type; preferring to swim close to their target, bite, and then swim away. The logic behind this is that most sharks avoid the desperate retaliation of a wounded animal. Seals bitten by sharks have been recorded to bite back.

Most bite-and-run types are smaller than the Great White Shark, whose one bite could kill you, given its massive jaws and the size of its serrated teeth. The Great White has been recorded to reach lengths of about 20 feet, which, along with its massive bulk, is like a small pointed gray submarine that bites.

Look closely at that shark that is encircling you.

Is Great?

Is it White?

Stay calm and be eaten slowly. Panic and be eaten quickly.

You decide.

the last bout

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Brandon Kowalski slowly pulled the white blanket toward himself, revealing his feet. He pulled some more and saw his bandaged right leg. Stitches lay underneath, he knew. He winced as he expected pain to shoot from the right side of his torso, where a thick pad kept in place by bandages covered more stitches. But there was no pain. His wince uncurled his 33-year-old angular face into wide-eyed wonder. "Morphine," he whispered in his mind.

He remembers punching sand-paperish skin while some 80 yards from the shore. "It" pulled away, leaving bleeding holes on his right leg. Brandon tried to hold on to his surfboard, which was now broken in two. The first bite had punctured his lungs with its upper jaw's teeth, the lower jaw's force cushioned by the surfboard. Brandon barely had time to curse. Wincing in pain, with internal bleeding setting in, he scissored his legs to keep afloat, and to look around: where is it? where is it now?

It came from his left side, his blindside, biting into his left arm. The waves separated surfer from surfboard as the six-footer repeatedly punched the twelve-foot shark's nose. It pulled away again. Adrenaline had dampened the wound-pains. He was trying again to scissor, to prepare for round four, but he had lost too much blood. The green-glistening water around him was now a murky crimson.

The humming of motor boats was getting near. With his head above-water, Brandon passed out. He did not see the shark fin rise some ten feet behind him. He did not hear the whish of the harpoon from the fishing boat that came to his rescue. He was unconscious as strong-armed fishermen, pulling him aboard, grunted under the strain of his dead weight. His bleeding bulk was on deck when the fishermen hauled onto the boat the other bleeding bulk from the sea.

Now, pain-numbed but awake, Brandon touched his left arm, where he had no feeling, and which he could not move. A knock on the door. His manager, Phil, took off his hat and stepped inside Room 312. Brandon closed his eyes and suddenly felt thirsty.

"From the fans," Phil said, gesturing to the flowers inside the room that Brandon had just noticed. Phil's alcoholic 58 year-old face wore the color of a dead man who rose from the morgue because he had a bet going down, and he wanted to know if he had won.

Phil walked to the table beside the bed. He picked up a ball of wet cotton and touched the bandaged man's lips with it. Due to massive blood loss and internal wounds, Brandon was still not allowed to drink large amounts of water. So he sucked on cotton.

Brandon's manager put the cotton on the tray and wiped his hands on his crumpled coat. His lips and lungs ached for a cigarette.

"How bad is it?" Brandon whispered.

"Your days in the ring," Phil said while cupping his pockets for his second pack, "are over."