This Woman’s Son Was Killed By A Shark

And now she's protesting against shark-culling in Western Australia …

Think all those images of great white sharks are doing your head in? What about all those stats? Still keen for a dawnie?

Imagine for a second, your child had met his fate in the jaws of one of those truck-sized machines at one of the prettiest beaches on earth. Which way would you swing on the great debate? Wouldn’t you want them all dead? Pulled from the ocean and strung from a crane at the end of the jetty?

Not Sharon Burden. In September 2011, her son Kyle died while surfing the pristine waters off Bunker Bay, a stretch of sand up the road a bit from Margaret River but a stone’s throw from a clump of rocks which is home to a healthy seal colony.

He’d been killed by a shark, either a bronze whaler or white pointer, either way it was big.Google the details if you must, but it ain’t pretty.

But rather than baying for blood, Sharon held firm that her son knew the risks and no peace was to be gained by blaming the shark, much less rounding up a posse and heading out to sea, guns blazing.

“If you look back at what I said to the press on the beach when Kyle died, you’ll see I was not in favour of any retribution then and my position certainly hasn’t changed,” says Sharon. “I just do not believe in the hunt and kill policy. There’s just too many holes in that argument.”

Sharon’s also a psychologist and believes the saturation of grizzly images put forward by the media this week after the EPA shut down the baited hook program is going to have a longer lasting impact than the discussion surrounding it.

“I have real concerns about what kind of impact this negative imagery and media coverage is going to have on people-particularly the children,” she says. “If you are constantly bombarding people with these images, you can’t expect there’s going to be a good outcome.  It doesn’t take much for that fear factor to be installed in kids, and it’s something they’ll carry for a very long time.”

Since her son’s death, Sharon put herself forward as an advocate against shark culling and addressed the WA State Parliament in February this year in a last ditch effort to stop the re deployment of drum lines planned for November.

It worked, but Sharon was also well aware of how the perception of her would be cast for her stance on the topic. “If you speak out against the drum-lines you’re immediately cast as a greenie. Well, no, I’m just speaking out against the drum-lines because I think we have better options and people just aren’t listening to the second part of that message.”

And those better options?

“We have been pushing for a community based model for shark mitigation programs so that local residents and councils determine what is best for their beach,” she says. “Unlike the Premier, we believe that there are strategies that could be in place within months such as the Eco-Shark Barrier, Shark Spotter program and proper signage. These strategies will not only reduce the risk of shark attacks, but also improve the safety on beaches when there are no surf lifesavers on duty.”

Sharon’s also calling for the funding set aside for the now defunct drum-line program is steered towards analysing exactly why sharks do what they do. But above all, Sharon is calling for an end to the divisive nature of the shark cull argument.

“I don’t see this (decision by the EPA) as a victory. I see it rather as a pause, and hopefully we can all put our heads together and move forward instead of getting stuck in this us and them type mentality we’ve seen this week.”