The 58-year-old, from Pennsylvania, was attacked near Green Cay after booking a trip with her family to New Providence Island. A police spokeswoman said family members of the woman saw a bull shark attack her in an area just half a mile from where a 21-year-old American woman was killed in a shark attack in 2019. The family was on a seven-night cruise on Royal Caribbean’s Harmony of the Seas, which departed Florida on Sunday. The woman suffered injuries to her upper body and was pulled from the water by family members and workers from the tour company, police said. She was taken to a hospital in New Providence where she was pronounced dead on Tuesday, police added. Cruise company Royal Caribbean International said the passenger who was killed had booked an independent excursion to Nassau and was supporting her family. The fatal incident comes a month after an eight-year-old British boy survived a shark attack in the Bahamas. Shark attacks on humans are generally rare. Image: A bull shark in the Bahamas. File photo: AP In 2021, there were 73 confirmed unprovoked attacks worldwide, of which nine were fatal. That was above the annual global average of five uncaused deaths, experts said. In total, at least 32 shark attacks have been reported in the Bahamas since 1749. Michael Heithaus, a marine biologist, said the number of attacks in the Bahamas is likely linked to the high number of people in the water in that area and its robust marine ecosystem. He said the Bahamas has a variety of shark species, the majority of which pay no attention to humans, except bull sharks and tiger sharks. “They get very large and eat large prey,” Mr Heithaus said, before adding that sharks have incredible sensory systems and can be attracted to food, sounds and smells in the water.
