Thursday 4 August 2022 11:46 AM World's shark attack hotspots REVEALED: Interactive map shows the areas with ... trends now
Last week, a snorkeller was left 'screaming for help' after being bitten by a shark off the coast of Cornwall in the first attack of its kind in British waters for 175 years.
The woman - who has not been identified - was in Penzance, Cornwall, with Blue Shark Snorkel Trips when the accident happened last Tuesday.
While unprovoked shark attacks are extremely rare in the seas around the UK, they're much more common in other parts of the world.
The Florida Museum has produced a handy interactive map that lets you explore the number of unprovoked shark attacks around the world.
It reveals that the USA is the shark attack hotspot of the world, with 1,563 unprovoked attacks since 1580, followed by Australia (682 attacks), Republic of South Africa (258 attacks) and Brazil (110 attacks).
The Florida Museum has produced a handy interactive map based on data from The International Shark Attack File (ISAF) that lets you explore the number of unprovoked shark attacks around the world since 1900
While unprovoked shark attacks are extremely rare in British waters, they're much more common in other parts of the world. Pictured: a great white shark
The interactive map is based on data from The International Shark Attack File (ISAF).
'The (ISAF) is the world's only scientifically-documented, comprehensive database of all known shark attacks,' The Florida Museum explains on its website.
'Initiated in 1958, there are now more than 6,800 individual investigations covering the period from the early 1500s to the present.'
A slider at the bottom of the map allows you to change the date range from 1900 to 2021, while you can also use toggles to select certain shark species, and whether or not the attacks were fatal.
You can then explore the number of unprovoked shark attacks around the world by drawing a box around data points you're interested in.
In 2021, there were 137 alleged shark-human interactions worldwide, according to the ISAF.
This included 73 unprovoked bites - those in which a bite on a live human occurred in the shark's natural habitat - and 39 provoked bites.
'Of the remaining 25 cases, four involved bites to motorized or non-motorized marine vessels ("boat bites") and one involved shark-inflicted post-mortem bites ("scavenge"),' Florida Museum explains.
'Five cases were regarded as "doubtful" or incidents that likely did not involve a shark.
'These included one case attributed to a stingray, three attributed to bony fish and
