National Geographic's SHARKFEST features shark scientists from Palm Beach County
Shark week is officially here, and there are plenty of shark-infested waters to wade through on all streaming platforms. But one shark show, National Geographic TV’s SHARKFEST series, filmed an episode in Palm Beach County.
West Palm Beach-based environmental science nonprofit ANGARI foundation and shark scientists from FIU and FAU are featured in the “Treasure Coast Terror!” episode of SHARKFEST’s “When Sharks Attack and Why” series.
Here’s what the episode is about and where to watch it.
What is National Geographic SHARKFEST?
The rest of the country may only observe shark week, but National Geographic has been celebrating SHARKFEST since July 1 because “one week is simply not enough,” according to Nat Geo’s website.
National Geographic’s SHARKFEST library has myriad shark shows to choose from, with titles like “Shark Below Zero,” “Bull Shark Bandits,” “When Sharks Attack 360,” “Sharkcano Hawaii,” and “When Sharks Attack and Why,” which includes the episode with ANGARI’s research team and South Florida shark scientists.
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Which episode of SHARKFEST is in West Palm Beach?
The third episode of “When Sharks Attack and Why” starts with a story from a St. Lucie County surfer, Jeremy Carr, who was a victim of a Bull Shark attack.
The entire episode focuses on a spike in shark attacks in the waters of the Treasure Coast and Palm Beach County during 2021 and investigates possible causes of the seven bites in the area that year.
In the episode, Toby Daly-Engel, director of the Florida Tech Shark Conservation Lab, explains why the area where Carr was bitten, the Indian River Lagoon, is a hotbed for Bull Sharks.
Stephen Kajiura, a biological sciences professor at Florida Atlantic University, appears on the episode to talk about sharks' ability to detect electric fields and rule out an increased use of metal detectors as a cause in the spike of Treasure Coast shark bites.
Florida International University’s Laura Garcia Barcia, an environmental biologist and wildlife toxicologist, appears in the “Treasure Coast Terror!” episode aboard an ANGARI Foundation research boat. Garcia Barcia explains that pollutants entering the ocean can impact sharks and explores how they affect how sharks hunt for their prey.
The National Geographic film crew follows Garcia Barcia and her team as they take blood samples from sharks to test for contaminants.
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Where to watch SHARKFEST during shark week
If you want to discover what might have led to the spike in shark attacks off of Florida’s Treasure Coast, you can stream the show in several different places.
You can watch “When Sharks Attack and Why” and other National Geographic SHARKFEST shows on National Geographic, Nat Geo WILD, Nat Geo Mundo, Disney+, Hulu and ESPN2.
Lianna Norman covers trending news in Palm Beach County for The Palm Beach Post. You can reach her at lnorman@pbpost.com. You can follow her reporting on social media @LiannaNorman on Twitter.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Shark Week includes National Geographic's South Florida SHARKFEST
