A GREAT white shark has been spotted in a marine park in Spain’s Balearic Islands, in the first confirmed sighting of the predator in Spanish waters for more than four decades. The 5-meter shark was tracked for more than an hour by an international conservation team in the Cabrera Archipelago National Park, a reserve 10 km off the southern coast of Majorca. The team from Alnitak, a Spanish conservation project with researchers from several European countries including the United Kingdom, published an image of the shark following the “historic sighting” Thursday. The organization said it would be releasing more footage and images later. Ten researchers, including British woman Georgina Stevens, were on board Alnitak’s vessel conducting data collection and monitoring when the shark was sighted, the group said. While there have been unconfirmed sightings and rumors of great white sharks in Spanish waters over the years, this is believed to be the first confirmed incident since 1976, when a Majorca fisherman caught a specimen measuring more than 6 meters. In 2006, a Spanish documentary film said that 27 great whites had been caught by fishermen in the Balearics between 1920 and 1976. But since then, the species had all but disappeared. (SD-Agencies) |