Shark spotted near Scarborough, Cape Elizabeth was a great white
Jul. 22—The towns of Scarborough and Cape Elizabeth confirmed Monday that the shark spotted recently near Richmond Island was a great white.
Daryen Granata, the harbormaster of the two Greater Portland communities, identified the shark after viewing two videos and sending them to multiple experts. He said the footage likely showed the same creature, not two different sharks.
One video was taken Friday by Capt. Keith Hall of Maine Coast Guide Service, which Granata received Monday afternoon. Another video, taken by a drone, was sent to Granata on Sunday morning, but he said he doesn't know who took it or when it was filmed.
Granata said the shark in the videos is probably the same shark that others reported seeing in the area last week as each of the four reports — two made last Thursday and another two Friday — said the shark was about 8 feet long.
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The Atlantic White Shark Conservancy also spotted a dead seal with shark bites on Scarborough Beach on Saturday.
"A bunch of people have asked me if it's the same shark that was spotted off Biddeford and the ones off Pine Point (Beach) and Crescent Beach, and my assumption would be yes," Granata said. "Obviously, I can't say for sure, but the size reports from all the different venues ... have been roughly the same."
John Chisholm, who studies sharks at the New England Aquarium and helped confirm some of the recent sightings, said that great white shark sightings are rising in Maine because more people are going farther out into the water, people can now document sightings with their phones and because of shark and seal conservation laws passed decades ago.
"There's a lot more people out on the water," Chisholm said. "And everybody has cellphones nowadays, so it's much easier for people to document what they see and share it online. ... The seals have been protected by the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972; white sharks themselves have been protected since 1997, so both of their populations are recovering. ... There's no doubt there's more sightings, but it's a factor of all these things coming together."
Nick Starosta, a marine science graduate student at the University of New England who helps detect sharks off the coast of Maine, agreed and said that the rising seal population — mostly a result, he thinks, of the Marine Mammal Protection Act — may be bringing great whites closer to shore in the Gulf of Maine.
"I think we're just now starting to see the populations of marine mammals rebound — and these bigger white sharks feed on marine mammals," Starosta said. "So they might be coming a little bit closer to shore ... to investigate."
Chisholm said rising temperatures in the Gulf of Maine are not increasing the number of great white sharks in southern Maine.
"White sharks can tolerate a wide range of temperatures," Chisholm said. "Temperature isn't really a limiting factor for them. ... There are summer species that we're starting to see move north. ... (The sand tiger shark) is a species that would be increasing its range, but not necessarily white sharks."
A great white was responsible for the only recorded fatal shark attack in Maine history, which took place in 2020 off the coast of Bailey Island in Harpswell. A 63-year-old woman was killed while swimming with her daughter.
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