Lifeguard Attacked and Killed by Shark off Sinaloa Coast
By Maureen Dietrich, The Mazatlan Messenger,22. November 2012
Altata, Navolato: Media reported today that 32-year-old lifeguard Cárdenas García was attacked by a shark at 11:40am off the Nuevo Altata beach after cutting rope that had entangled him in high waves.
The young lifeguard was rescued by his compañeros but died of the wounds in the hospital.
Local lifeguards and rescue personnel said this shark attack was very unusual, an isolated incident.
Juan Acereto, President of the Sinaloa Association of Sports Fishing, suggested that as there were seals in the area, they might have attracted the large predator, which could have been a white shark, a mako or a cornuda. He added that sharks are usually found in open water, not in the bahía.
Professor Leobardo Plomosa of the Faculty of Ocean Sciences advised there have been few instances of shark attacks in Mexico or Sinaloa.
Civil protection in Navolato closed the beach to swimmers for the next three days. (from Noroeste)
Source: The Mazatlan Messenger
Was the shark entangled in the rope or the lifeguard?
God Bless Cardenas. It is a very unfortunate incident.
The Pasific part of Mexico is a wild place in general. All kinds of game fish and tuna is widely found as well as all kinds of wildlife, sharks to whales. This place is actually around 500 km south of the last months GWS catch by mexican fisherman from the sea.
( http://sharkyear.com/2012/mexican-fisherman-lands-great-white-shark.html#comments) A small distance for a GWS. We have no details of how it happened, but I think this is most probably a GWS incident.
People are building new establishments all around the Mexican Pasific Coast. I remember few years back there were a few surfer incidents, some fatal, in relatively close beaches from this location.
New settlements, more people using the ocean, almost no shark emergency protocols in place. I hope to see this as the last incident in Mexico.