THE HAWAII SHARK TASK FORCE[*]
Introduction
November 5, 1992 was not a good day for Bill Paty, Director of the Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources and Chairman of the Hawaii Shark Task Force. The Task Force had been created by Governor John Waihee six months before in response to growing public demand that the State do something about a spate of fatal and near fatal tiger shark attacks on swimmers and surfers in Island waters. The Task Force had spent the past months mired in internal controversy, unable to reach consensus on any particular course of action, and now another local boy, eighteen year old Aaron Romento, was dead, having bled out after being bitten while boogie boarding off Oahu's Waianae Coast only 25 feet from shore.[1]
Romento hadn't seen the shark coming. He'd been hit in the legs, a single bite tearing open the back of his right thigh and knee, severing a couple of major leg arteries and knocking him off his boogie board. His friend, Rick Villamor, recalled, "All I saw was red blood everywhere. My initial reaction was to get out of there and go to the shore. But then I turned around to help him and saw a very large bite chomped out of his lower leg area, calf area." Villamor pulled Romento out of the water, where they met Keoni Watson, another surfer who was just about to dive into the water. Watson used a towel to fashion a makeshift tourniquet. "We were talking to him, trying to keep him with us," remembered Watson, "but his eyes were rolling back. I think he lost too much blood in the first thirty seconds."
Watson was right. Aaron Romento was pronounced dead on arrival at the Waianae Coast Comprehensive Medical Clinic at 10:10 a.m.
The attack on Aaron Romento hit Paty like a blast furnace. It shouldn't have happened at all. It completely contradicted the accepted wisdom about when and where shark attacks were more or less likely to occur. Aaron hadn't been in the water at dawn or dusk, when the nocturnally feeding tiger sharks are more likely to be near shore. He wasn't near the mouth of a stream that might just have carried a dead boar or some other carrion down from the mountains. There had been no fishing anywhere in the area. He wasn't swimming alone or in deep water far offshore. Aaron Romento had been boogie boarding in clear water with a large group of other people right near the beach in mid-morning nowhere near a stream. So much for previous Task Force exhortations about the predictability of shark attacks and the simple precautions people could take to avoid them...
Newspaper coverage of the attack included outraged demands that the State stop dillydallying and do something. This last fatal attack -- the third in less than a year. Surely confirmed growing suspicions that something was happening with the shark population. Perhaps the comeback of the endangered green sea turtle, which tigers are known to eat and which, from underwater, bears a striking resemblance to a human body boarder or surfer, was leading to an increase in the tiger shark population and attacks based on cases of "mistaken identity." Perhaps overfishing was bringing more big sharks closer to shore. Perhaps for some unknown reasons, tiger sharks were migrating southeastward from Hawaii's northwestern string of small islands atolls, reefs, and shoals. The one thing that was certain was that the State had not since the
1960's conducted any sort of shark control program.[2] Perhaps the population was increasing too rapidly and should once again be reduced by deliberate, controlled culling of large tiger sharks.
Paty thought back over the attacks which had occurred during the past year. Something did indeed seem to be changing.
The opening salvo hit on the morning of November 26, 1991 in a small bay near Lahaina, on the Island of Maui.[3] That morning, longtime Olowalu resident Martie Morrell and her house guest from the Canada, obstetrician-gynecologist Dr. Louise Sourisseau, went for a swim in Olowalu Bay. The two were wearing face masks. Dr. Sourisseau initially saw a large dark shape in the somewhat murky water below. Suddenly, a huge shark swam between them and grabbed Martie Morrell.
Dr. Sourisseau tried to beat the shark off of her friend, and suffered skin abrasions from its rough skin. She was pushed away and then thought that her friend had found a log in the water and was using it to beat the shark off. Then, with gathering shock and horror, she realized that the "log" she had seen was in fact her friend's severed arm, bitten clear off and now floating in the water. Sourisseau turned and swam for shore in search of help.
Once on shore, Dr. Sourisseau found Nathan Kamisoto, a repairman working on the Morrell's windows and screens. Kamisoto grabbed a boogie board, and swam out in search of
Ms. Morrell. Reported Kamisoto to commentators, "I just paddled around a little while and I
found her, kind of floating." He thought she had drowned, and paddled Closer to retrieve her body. But then, "I got to, like, about ten feet away from her and all I saw was this whole, this, this, like -- in front of me -- this...big mouth opening up and just coming up and just -- oh boy - the eyes rolling back and, you know, jaws, the whole thing." Then, Kamisoto watched the shark "pick her up like a rag doll and swish her around," and he thought to himself, "Jesus, I cannot do nothing." As the shark lifted out of the water, Kamisoto clearly saw the characteristic striped markings of a tiger shark. Autopsy results confirmed Kamisoto's observations. Martie
Morrell's body, missing both legs, an arm, a hand, and part of the buttocks, bore bite marks characteristic of a fifteen to sixteen foot long tiger shark.
Not three months later on February 19th, the next bomb fell. In the late afternoon, Bryan
Adona, an off-duty Aloha Airlines airplane mechanic, paddled out to Leftovers, a popular surfing spot about a mile away from Oahu's Waimea Bay. The last person to see Bryan was fellow surfer Danny Titilah. Titilah reported to the Honolulu Advertiser, "He [Adona] went way out to the left." Suddenly, about 200 feet from shore, Titilah saw a huge shape break the surface of the water. "I thought it was a walrus," said Titilah. "and I told my friend and he said don't mess around, like if it was a seal you wouldn't want to get near it if there was a baby seal there." "I see it come up and come down," he continued, "like that shark -at Universal Studios, a boil and then a lot of water pouring off the back." Titilah paddled in. But he didn't think to alert Bryan
Adona, who was still way outside to the left, by himself.
Bryan Adona was never seen again, but his board, identified by his car key, still attached to a ring at the front, washed up the next morning. It had a 16 inch bite taken out of it, consistent with an attack by a 12 to 13 foot tiger shark.[4] The wrist leash had been severed about half way down.
A little over a month later, surfer Jude Chamberlain was attacked in the early morning off Cannon's Reef near Haena on the Island of Kauai. Paddling with her friend Michael Cox,
Ms. Chamberlain felt a sharp pain in her left foot, which was attached to her board by an ankle leash. The pain she felt was caused by a large shark, which had clamped down on the back of -her board, puncturing her foot and knocking her off the board in the process. The shark shook the board violently and then pulled it completely under water.
Because she was attached to her board by an ankle leash, Chamberlain was pulled backward as the shark carried the board through the water. Suddenly, the shark let go of the board and, remarkably, Chamberlain had the presence of mind to climb back on. Miraculously, she and Cox made it to shore without further incident.
The following October, Rick Gruzinsky was attacked as he surfed off Laniakea, on Oahu's north shore. He had hit the clear water at about 7:30 a.m. and paddled out about a hundred yards. He was just about a mile from where Bryan Adona had disappeared some months before.
Reported Gruzinsky, "I had caught two very small junk waves." Between the first and the second, he had seen a large sea turtle, swimming fast enough to 'make a wake behind it. After the second, he saw a large shape beneath him, and at first, thought it was the turtle again. He thought to himself, "What the hell is that thing doing under me?" Then, he saw white and his board was flipped up out of the water. "It lifted me up with such ease and the board rolled over and I rolled with it," Gruzinsky recalled. Again upright on the water, Gruzinsky watched as the shark appeared from below, rocked onto its side, and bit into the front of his surfboard. He stared into the shark's black eye, which was now less than a foot away from his left hand. Then, the piece of the board in the shark's mouth broke away, and the huge animal receded under water. Gruzinsky paddled frantically for shore, screaming and splashing, a sixteen inch chunk taken out of the side of his surfboard.
All this, and now, Aaron Romento.
The Shark Attack Task Force
The Shark Attack task force reconvened on November 17th, twelve days after the attack on Romento, with a renewed sense of urgency. In addition to the actual attacks on surfers, there had been an increase in telephone calls from both lifeguards and surfers reporting large shark sightings. Hundreds of calls were coming in from angry residents and tourist industry representatives, demanding aggressive action to reduce the shark population and lessen the danger to swimmers and surfers. A smaller, but no less vehement segment of the population, largely composed of native Hawaiian activists, demanded that the sharks, which in traditional Hawaiian culture were often viewed as harboring 'aumakua -- protective, ancestral spirits -- be left alone. Worse perhaps than the angry calls, the Romento and Gruzinsky attacks had attracted the attention of mainland newspapers and television news programs, something that economically vital tourist interests feared almost as much as armageddon itself. Clearly, something would have to be done.
Over the following months, the Task Force conducted meetings and took informal testimony from a wide variety of stakeholders in the shark situation. Those providing input included marine biologists, ecologists, and fisheries experts, representatives from the native Hawaiian community, the tourist industry, lifeguards, and surfing organizations. Individuals who had been directly affected by shark attacks, including Aaron Romento's mother and Martie
Morrell's widowed husband also testified. Summaries, reflecting a representative sample of the testimony provided, are attached as Exhibits J - O.
In addition to taking testimony, the Task Force requested and received a variety of statistical reports and summaries. These included: An annotated list of shark attack cases in the
Hawaiian Islands from 1779-1993 prepared by George H. Balazs of the National Marine Fisheries Service, a Project of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA);[5] a summary of shark attack cases by month for the years 1779-1993;[6] and a summary of shark attack cases involving fatalities for the years 1779-1990 (by decade).[7]
By the end of these meetings, four different courses of action had been proposed for the Task Force's consideration. They included:
1. Immediately launch a shark control program similar to the Tester Program of the late 1960's, the goal of which would be substantially to reduce (by at least 60%) the population of large sharks, especially tiger sharks, in near shore Hawaiian waters.
2. Take no action to reduce the shark population, at least until additional reliable scientific information about shark population biology, behavior, and ecology could be obtained through planned and ongoing marine research efforts. Seek additional private and government resources to speed the pace of this research, if possible. In the meantime, continue with efforts to educate the public about the ways of reducing risk of shark attack.
3. Conduct a limited hunt for the culpable shark in the immediate vicinity of and immediately after an attack. Institute a shark sighting hotline and, after confirmed sightings or attacks, post warning signs on shore near the sighting or attack. Continue with public education efforts designed to inform people of ways to reduce risk of attack.
4. Take no official action to reduce the shark population or hunt down specific sharks after an attack. Permit the native Hawaiian community to deal with shark attacks in their traditional way, by turning the matter over to the family which had traditionally carried on a spiritual relationship with the sharks in that area.
Your Task
You are an attorney working as Governor's Office of Legal Counsel, and in that capacity, serve on the Hawaii Shark Task Force. In light of the facts related above, the testimony taken and statistical information received by the Task Force, what course of action (either those described above or some other) would you support and recommend to the Governor?
LIST OF EXHIBITS
Exhibit A: Honolulu Advertiser article re: Romento attack
Exhibit B: Honolulu Advertiser article re: Morrell attack
Exhibit C: Honolulu Advertiser article re: Adona's disappearance
Exhibit D: Honolulu Advertiser article re: threats on James Stegmuller following his retention to hunt sharks after the Morrell attack.
Exhibit E: Honolulu Advertiser Article entitled "Expert: Tiger Shark Population Increasing"
Exhibit F: G.H. Balazs, "Annotated List of Shark Attack Cases in the Hawaiian Islands 17791993" in Jim Borg, TIGERS OF THE SEA: HAWAII'S DEADLY SHARKS (Mutual Publishing, 1993)
Exhibit G: Photograph fifteen foot tiger shark hooked off Haleiwa in December 1992 (from J. Borg, photo by Bruce Asato)