A spear fisherman in Florida experienced a life-threatening encounter with a shark while in the Bahamas.

What happened?

According to CBS 12 News, Florida resident Eddie Jarmakowicz was snorkeling and spearfishing in the Bahamas when he encountered a shark. 

Jarmakowicz said that he was swimming back up to the surface after spearing a mutton snapper, with the fish close to his left hand. As he was nearing the surface, a shark approached from behind and grabbed the fish, pulling Jarmakowicz's hand and arm into its mouth, as well. 

Thankfully, he was able to pull back and get away. While he didn't see the shark that bit him, a friend did, and reported that it appeared to be a six-foot-long reef shark. 

After swimming back to his boat, Jarmakowicz visited a local clinic, which did what it could but wasn't equipped to handle a shark bite. Luckily, a pilot offered to fly him back home where he went through a four and a half hour surgery to repair eight tendons.

Jarmakowicz emphasized the need to remain vigilant in the water to CBS 12 News when he explained, "When you're fishing, you always look down to the bottom to watch for sharks, and I let my guard down when I was transitioning to look up at the boat."

Why is this human-wildlife encounter concerning?

As Jarmakowicz's experience demonstrated, human-wildlife encounters have a bad habit of going incredibly wrong.

When people encounter wildlife, whether on land or in the sea, these encounters often lead to injury or even death. This isn't only harmful to the person attacked, but also often to the animal. If authorities track down the wild animal that attacked, they will often euthanize it, which contributes to the depletion of wildlife populations and hinders efforts at conservation.

In many instances, too, when wild animals attack, it isn't their fault. In Jarmakowicz's encounter, it seems the shark inadvertently ended up with the man's hand while trying to steal the fish. In several cases, people provoke animals into attacking, and most wildlife species are only close to humans because they have lost their natural habitats due to extreme weather, the growth of the human population, and changes in climate. 

When habitat loss occurs, natural resources become unavailable, forcing wildlife species to migrate closer to areas more populated with people, leading to increased human-wildlife encounters and more animal attacks.

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How can I protect myself from human-wildlife encounters?

As Jarmakowicz pointed out, remaining vigilant at all times when in areas that wild animals also inhabit is critical to protecting yourself from an encounter. 

Taking care of the environment around you also helps protect from human-wildlife encounters, as it allows ecosystems to thrive and prevents habitat loss, allowing wildlife to stay where they belong.

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