“You never regret a swim.” That’s what I say to myself and others when deciding whether or not to go to the beach in Australia. And once at the beach, whether or not to go into the water.
But now I think that saying is no longer true. You can regret a swim - deeply, if you are attacked by a shark.
The four shark attacks in 48 hours in New South Wales this week have put a state full of water lovers on edge.
To not go in on these beautiful January days, with the water sparkling and inviting and the air warm, feels deeply counterintuitive.
Instead all sorts of bargains and contortions are made on the shore. Would it be alright if I just went in to my knees? Or what about swimming in the middle of the day? How about if the water is clear and it didn’t rain overnight? What if there are other people in the water? What if the area is netted?
It feels as though we’re all teetering on the edge of the shore this week.
As well as the attacks dominating the news, there are the stories of near misses, the Reddit threads about shark hunters along the NSW coast, footage of a 200kg bull shark hanging over the side of a dingy at Camp Cove (it appears to have four rows of teeth!), a viral video of school rowers on the Parramatta River metres away from an apparent bull shark breaching, and reports of a shark at Sydney’s Coogee beach, which cleared the water.
Statistically the chances of getting killed by a shark are less than being killed by a kangaroo. But they fall to zero if you don’t get in the water.
To go into the water this week in Sydney feels like Russian roulette.
This has been a year (and it’s only January) where the natural world is striking back.
Our summer has so far been characterised by harsh and sudden natural events – a flash flood in Lorne and Wye River that submerged and swept away cars and caravans. And bushfires, also in Victoria, that “were unlike anything seen before in speed, scale and destruction”.
Likewise, the four shark attacks in a matter of days is another sudden shock to humans, whose relationship with nature has long been out of balance.
Yet shark attacks in Australia are still rare events, averaging around 20 incidents with injuries annually, far fewer than drownings or road fatalities, but data shows a rising trend in recent years.
The Taronga Conservation Society Australia told the ABC the average number of shark bite incidents recorded annually over a decade has increased every 10 years since the 1950s.
In the 2020s, an average of 27 bites were recorded each year, and at least three incidents on average were fatal, the data showed.
In 2025, there were fewer shark injuries but a slightly higher number of fatalities compared with the decade average.
We suffer more in imagination than reality, said the ancient Stoic philosopher Seneca. But if you are a beachgoer in Sydney this week, even these relatively reassuring stats, and being rational about the risk of a swim, can’t completely quell the fear, particularly if it feels close by.
I live on Sydney Harbour, where one of my goals is to properly learn to standup paddleboard without falling in with an enormous splash. But I haven’t dared risk it since my neighbour was mauled by a shark out the front of our building.
And a decade before that, on a beautiful, sparkling day in Byron Bay, I walked to the water’s edge to swim, wondering why no one else was in the ocean, only to look down the shore and see a tent set up with emergency services attending to a man who was attacked by a shark and later died.
Perhaps part of our cultural fear of sharks is that attacks happen in the context of relief and pleasure. Relief from the heat, from ordinary life on land, and the pleasure of catching a wave, of being submerged in cool, refreshing water.
The water is such a huge part of living in Sydney, and why many of us come here from other parts of the country or the world.
Take the water away and you have some interesting birds, good food and national parks – but not much that would distinguish it from a city anywhere else.
The water defines life here – from how we spend our leisure time, to our hobbies, to the organising principle of our social and economic systems.
The “good life” in Sydney for many is being able to access the water whenever you want. And it is access to water that has been the flashpoint for social issues – such as the Cronulla riots.
Memories of this sharky summer will fade, and confidence will return – until the next spate of attacks. But perhaps the answer to saving lives and limbs, while also quelling the fear of getting in the water, is to have more information available about whether it’s safe to swim.
While I knew to avoid swimming at dawn and dusk in the harbour, until this week, I did not know that brackish water, splashes and storms attracted sharks closer in.
Just like we can check a weather app and know if the UV is going to be high that day, or if there’s going to be a total fire ban, perhaps we should also have some sort of public warning when it’s likely to be sharky.
Brigid Delaney is the author of the philosophical novel The Seeker and the Sage (Allen and Unwin)
