Shark-Dive Death

(Miami, Florida) A 49-year-old Austrian lawyer, Markus Groh, died this past weekend after going on a shark-diving adventure in the open waters off the Bahamas. The sea had been chummed and Groh went down without a protective cage in search of hammerheads and tiger sharks. He was bitten on the leg and apparently died from loss of blood.

The vacation excursion was operated by Abernethy's Scuba Adventures.

Chummed, open-water shark dives had been banned in Florida waters by the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission because of the danger. As a result, operators take adventurers to Bahamian waters.

George Burgess, Director of the International Shark File at the U. of Florida, said the attack on Groh was the first shark-bite death of the year. And since the waters were chummed with bloody fish guts, the attack was provoked. The sharks cannot be blamed.