Everything You Need to Know About Shark Attacks as Told by Graphs
— -- The twin shark attacks that left two teens injured in North Carolina on Sunday are just the latest in a rising number of shark attacks to send fear through the hearts of ocean lovers.
Data collected by the Florida Museum of Natural History at the University of Florida has broken down more than a century's worth of shark attack data to put the most recent attacks in perspective.
People who are using some kind of flotation device on the surface of the water have been the most frequently attacked individuals in recent years, according to their findings.
The data shows that before such flotation devices -- which include boogie boards, jet skis and surf boards -- became so mainstream, the people who were attacked tended to be swimmers and bathers.
Like the most recent cases in North Carolina, the vast majority of attacks result in non-fatal injuries, the data shows.
Researchers had difficulty nailing down the exact number of injuries and fatalities that each species of shark was responsible for because victims have trouble remembering accurate details about their attacks.
That said, they were able to determine that the vast majority of sharks that attacked humans were great white sharks, followed by tiger sharks and then bull sharks.
All told, there were at least 27 different types that had been identified in attacks over the past 434 years.
Shark attacks have been reported across the globe but, as the following map shows, the continental U.S. has served as the most frequent attack grounds.
While North Carolina has had at least three reported attacks in the past week, the state is tied for fifth place when it comes to the most frequent attack spot globally.
Though the latest formalized data only covered through last year, California and North Carolina were tied in fifth, preceded by Florida, Australia, Hawaii and South Carolina respectively.
