"There were so many tooth marks all over the skeleton that the attack must have lasted for some time."
This year’s staging of the XXXII Olympic Games has been nothing if not easy. Host nation Japan has had to battle Covid-19, a less-than-happy population, staggering costs, nightmarish logistical challenges, a year’s delay and no way to call the whole thing off.
Surfing, which will make its grand debut, seems particularly snakebit with many injuries, Kelly Slater recently declaring that competition could happen in “lake-flat conditions” since the governing bodies chose not to hold the event in his eponymous tank and now the discovery of the world’s oldest shark attack victim.
Surfer?
It cannot be ruled out.
The body was found by Oxford scientists all the way across Honshu island from Tsurigasaki, where Olympic surfing will take place.
Researchers told CNN, “We were initially flummoxed by what could have caused at least 790 deep, serrated injuries to this man. There were so many injuries and yet he was buried in the community burial ground, the Tsukumo Shell-mound cemetery site. Through a process of elimination, we ruled out human conflict and more commonly-reported animal predators or scavengers.”
Which left either the mighty Great White or extra-vicious Tiger.
After mapping his wounds and creating a 3D model of his skeleton, it was concluded that the man was still alive at the time of the attack.
“We suspect that the man was probably out fishing with some companions in the Inland Seto Sea in southern Japan. They could have been fishing from a boat, or diving for shellfish. Perhaps they were even hunting sharks, as shark teeth are sometimes found in Jōmon archaeological sites. One or more sharks — we suspect one but can’t be certain about that — attacked the man either while he was already in the water, or perhaps he lost his balance and fell, or was pulled overboard if the shark was on a fishing line — this would not have been a small shark. There were so many tooth marks all over the skeleton that the attack must have lasted for some time.”
Will the brutal, lengthy and likely very painful strike be weighing in on the minds of Olympic-bound surfers as they ready to paddle into the nature Kelly Slater warned about?
How could it not be.