“I had my shark band on my foot, and I assume it must have kept the shark at bay.”
It was the wildest four days I can remember, four days in late January, 2026.
After five bulls shark attacks, kid dead in the harbour, surfer legless at Manly, boards bashed to hell at Freshie and Point Plomer, and don’t forget the gal who was killed and her boyfriend maimed by a bull shark in November, bull sharks became an item of concern on surfers’ agendas.
Shortly after schoolboy Nico Antic was hit and killed by a bull shark at the jump rock just around the corner from the Sydney Harbour beach Nielsen Park, the Newcastle shark fisherman Joel Nancarrow drove his lil tinny two hours south and dragged a half-ton bull out of the drink just off the beach at Camp Cove, a few beaches east, to show the world how populous bulls had become.
Bulls, bulls, bulls.
Who knew!
Now, the co-founder of Sharkbanz deterrent bands, Californian Nathan Garrison, says there’s been a 30% boom in sales from Australia in January.
“Deterrents can be part of that but understanding what’s driving the additional shark activity and how to avoid high-risk areas is super-important too,” Garrison told the Sydney press. “These are safety devices, and they can’t eliminate risk altogether.”
An instructor at a Bondi surf school says it’s rare to see a kid turn up for his lesson without one of the Sharkbanz2 wearable bands, $A185 or the Bethany Hammo signature edition at $A175.
Do they work?
Dee Why surfer Alex Preston thinks so, just not in the way they were designed.
See, the Sharkbanz spiel is they use powerful, permanent rare earth magnets to create an electromagnetic field that overstimulates a shark’s sensitive electroreceptors. And when sharks approach within rang, this harmless, intense sensation causes them to turn away.
The raw magnets themselves are not particularly expensive for the type used. Comparable strong neodymium magnets can cost just a few dollars each retail (e.g., $5–$20 for powerful ones on sites like Amazon or magnet suppliers), and ferrite versions are even cheaper
But, as Preston, who was a pal of Mercury Psillaski, the surfer killed by a Great White the previous September, tells it, twas the bulk of the ankle bracelet that deterred the shark and not the magnets.
“It had a crack at my legs … it was quite a banal interaction until I saw the video and got the full picture of it,” Preston told the Sydney Morning Herald. “I had my shark band on my foot, and I assume it must have kept the shark at bay.”