Shark-diving banned in Western Australia

Nature Posted on 11/07/2012

Cave diving with sharks will be banned in Western Australia as part of a rigorous clamp down on shark tourism. Swimming alongside great white sharks is a chief tourist attraction in the region and annually thousands of Britons take the long ride down under to try this exhilarating activity. The ban means that adrenaline junkies will instead have to journey to Southern Australia and South Africa to take to the waters with great white sharks.

The ban has come into place after four fatal shark attacks in the area between September 2011 and March 2012. Fisheries Minister, Norman Moore, explained that shark tourism in Western Australia relies on baiting sharks to lure them in for tourists' pleasure. This is not the case in South Australia and South Africa where cage diving operates in sites where great white sharks congregate naturally, and thus they do not have to be enticed or aggravated for the sport. Therefore, travellers can still enjoy the activity in safer surroundings further down the Australian coast.

Britons will be particularly affected by the ban as British holidaymakers comprise almost a third of the total visitors received in Western Australia each year. Nonetheless, travellers to Western Australia can still enjoy world-class water activities such as whale watching, swimming with dolphins, surfing and sailing, as well as vising Australia's 'sun-capital' Perth on the south-west coast.

Find your flight to Perth with the easyvoyage.co.uk search engine.

In brief : Nature