A popular AIDS and community services fundraiser in Provincetown, Mass., was forced to change plans to prevent participants from being attacked by Great White sharks.
For the past 31 years, Swim for Life has raised money for charity with hundreds of participants collecting donations in exchange for the chance to swim or paddle kayaks across Provincetown Harbor. But as of 2019, that crossing of the harbor is no more.
Officials with Provincetown Community Compact, the sponsor of Swim for Life, announced that “the appearance of white sharks” in the area has inspired a change in the route of the event. Cape Cod Times reports that things changed because the seal population has increased and they moved into the area. Where there are seals, there are sharks that think seals are delicious.
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This isn’t just paranoia. In 2018, a 26-year-old man named Arthur Medici was riding a boogie board at Newcomb Hollow Beach, approximately 15 miles south of Provincetown, when a shark bit him on the leg. Medici’s friend pulled him to the beach, but he died before paramedics could bring him to the hospital.
In 2012, a 50-year-old man named Chris Myers was swimming at a beach in Truro, 10 miles south of Provincetown, when a shark bit him on the leg. Myers survived.
Before these two incidents, no shark attacks have happened in Cape Cod since 1932.
It should be noted that both of these attacks happened on beaches along the Atlantic Ocean, facing east. Provincetown’s harbor faces Cape Cod Bay, and is protected by a strip of land that curls into the bay, ending with the lighthouse at Long Point. Swim for Life participants would enter the water at Long Point and swim to The Boatslip, a hotel that is directly across the water, 1.4 miles away.
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The lighthouse at Long Point, Provincetown
Great White sharks have not yet been spotted in Provincetown Harbor, but sending sending several hundred people into that deep water, splashing around and wearing wetsuits that make them look like seals, is just asking for trouble.
The new route for the event has not been finalized, but rumor has it that participants will travel along the shore, where it is much safer.
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