A 16-year-old teenage girl has died after being attacked by a shark while swimming in a river in Western Australia.
She was pronounced dead on Saturday after being pulled from the Swan River in the Perth suburb of Fremantle.
The girl from Perth is believed to have been speeding down the river with her friends on a jet ski when the incident happened.
Chief Superintendent Paul Robinson of the Western Australian Police said she may have jumped into the sea to swim with dolphins she saw nearby.
He described the incident as “very, very traumatic” and said the girl’s family was “absolutely devastated by the news”.
People are being called to respect the closure of the coast and take “special precautions”.
According to Robinson, fishing experts say it’s unusual to see sharks in that part of the river.
It is believed to be the first shark fatality on the Swan River since January 1923, when a 13-year-old boy died.
Australia normally records about 20 shark attacks each year, mostly in New South Wales and Western Australia.
There will be two shark deaths in 2021 and seven in 2020.
Historically, shark bite deaths are rare. More than a century of records show that shark mortality in Australia is 0.9, less than one person per year.
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