A woman has died after being attacked by a shark off Kyles Beach on the mid-north coast of New South Wales.
NSW Police said a woman in her 20s was murdered on a beach in Crowdy Bay on Thursday morning.
Emergency services were called to the beach at around 6.30am to reports that two people had been bitten by a shark.
A police spokesperson said, “Witnesses assisted the couple before NSW Ambulance paramedics arrived; however, the woman died at the scene.”
A man – also believed to be in his 20s – was airlifted to John Hunter Hospital in a critical condition. Later his condition improved to serious but stable.
Police Chief Inspector Timothy Bailey said on Thursday that “they knew each other (and) they were going swimming at the time”.
Kyles Beach was closed and police were liaising with experts from the Department of Primary Industries to determine the species of shark involved. A report was to be prepared for the coroner.
A DPI spokesperson said, “A female swimmer has died and a male swimmer has been seriously injured as a result of the incident”.
The department was deploying five “smart” drumlines at Kyles Beach. The “real-time shark management alert” drumline used in NSW is a non-lethal tagging method that lures the shark using a baited hook.
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When an animal is trapped, operators receive a ping and reach the scene in an average of 17 minutes. The sharks are tagged, released further into the ocean, and then tracked by satellite and acoustically.
Surf Life Saving NSW said Kellys and surrounding beaches would be closed for at least 24 hours. Drones were monitoring the area.
The remote part of the beach was not patrolled, the organization said, with the nearest surf club being at Crowdy Head to the south.
“This is a terrible tragedy and our deepest sympathies go out to the families of the man and woman involved,” Surf Life Saving NSW chief executive Steve Pearce said on Thursday.
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“We were able to immediately activate our drone capability and have assets on scene to monitor and report on any remaining threats in the area. For now, please stay out of the water at nearby beaches.”
The woman’s death comes less than three months after Mercury Psilakis was killed by a 3.5 meter long great white shark off Sydney’s Long Reef beach in early September.
There have been five deaths due to shark bites in Australia this year.
There were 13 unprovoked bite incidents in 2024 that resulted in no deaths – 10 fewer unprovoked bite incidents than in 2023, when there were four deaths. There were seven unprovoked fatal attacks in 2020.
“Broadly speaking, across Australia and over the last two decades, the number of shark bites has increased,” Professor Charlie Huveniers, director of Flinders University’s Marine and Coastal Research Consortium, told Guardian Australia after Psilakis’ death.
More people are using water than ever before – but that’s only part of the explanation.
Huveniers said in September that coastal population growth, climate breakdown, habitat loss, the rise of water sports, weather anomalies, distribution of prey and even better wetsuits – keeping us in the water longer and in the colder months – are among 40 factors that could contribute to the increase, depending on location.
Deaths are a different story. Rob Harcourt, Emeritus Professor of Marine Ecology at Macquarie University, has said that due to faster emergency responses, tourniquet kits at every surf life saving club and first aid training, the number of deaths from shark bites today per capita is likely to be the same or lower than in the 1930s.
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