Shark populations are rebounding in the Gulf. What does it mean for swimmers?

The growing crowds on Gulf Coast beaches are beginning to confront an uneasy truth: They are now sharing the water with more sharks than they have in decades.

After years of conservation work, the population of many shark species that live near the coastline and out at sea are returning to levels not seen since the 1970s.

Their return is helping restore nature’s delicate balance. It is also raising new safety questions as record numbers of visitors arrive to swim and fish across Gulf beaches.

“People are just going to have to get used to seeing sharks,” said Dean Grubbs, an associate director of research at Florida State University, who has studied the animals for more than two decades. “And they’re going to have to take precautions.”

Florida Panhandle residents were rattled earlier this summer when a shark attacked and severely injured a man swimming near a U.S. Navy Installation in Panama City. Days earlier, authorities near WaterColor, Florida, temporarily closed 5 miles of beachfront amid reports of a possible shark bite after a child emerged from knee-deep water with a leg wound.

The incidents made harrowing headlines for the first time since 2024, when sharks bit three tourists in one day at beaches along Florida’s Scenic Highway 30A.

But researchers say beachgoers have little to fear. Sharks are already swimming in their midst, and the chances of being attacked are almost infinitesimal.

“If everybody knew how close they swam to sharks, they’d be terrified,” said Gavin Naylor, director of a shark research program at the Florida Museum of Natural History, which manages a database of shark attacks around the world.

“If the sharks really wanted to target people, we’d have about 5,000 shark bites a day,” he added. “But the fact that we see so few of them means the sharks are doing their level best to avoid these people.”

Shark resurgence

It is difficult to track precisely how many sharks are living across the Gulf. But researchers know the population of many species dropped when the U.S. opened trade with China in the 1970s, which gave fishermen access to international shark fin markets.

Fisheries management plans that began in the 1990s started to help populations bounce back. Now, the resurgence is posing a complex new question for many fast-growing beach communities: Are humans ready to live with sharks?

Some governments are already responding. President Donald Trump last week signed legislation backed by Alabama Sen. Katie Britt creating a process for sending emergency cellphone alerts to beachgoers near any future shark attacks. The bill is known as “Lulu’s Law” in honor of Lulu Gribbin, an Alabama teenager who survived the 30A attack in 2024.

“The timing of this law couldn’t be better,” Britt said last week, “as countless Americans are enjoying our nation’s beaches this summer.”

Researchers say the return of sharks, which Gulf Coast visitors sometimes spot from condo balconies overlooking the water, can keep other species in check. Scientists have documented the number of baby bull sharks in Mobile Bay, Alabama, has grown by fivefold over the past two decades as waters warm there. Great white sharks are migrating thousands of miles from the northeast United States to the Gulf each winter, though most stay miles from shore.

The shift is also forcing fishermen to adapt. One angler was bit last month after he hooked a bull shark near Pensacola, Florida. Congress is considering establishing a federal task force that would help anglers solve the pesky and growing problem of sharks snatching fish from their lines.

And scientists are confronting a surge of questions as they race to understand how climate change will impact sharks’ behavior in the future. Researchers believe some shark species are now swimming closer to Gulf Coast shores earlier in the year and staying there longer as water temperatures warm. But they are still studying how shark habitats might change and what species will prove most resilient as climate change intensifies.

“It is a giant unknown,” Grubbs said.

Rare attacks

Twenty-three unprovoked shark attacks have been reported over the past 25 years in the waters between southeast Louisiana and the Florida Panhandle, according to the Florida Museum of Natural History’s database. Just one has been fatal: A bull shark killed a 14-year-old from Gonzales, who was boogie boarding about 100 yards offshore from a beach near Destin in 2005.

Researchers say such tragedies are often the result of confusion. John Carlson, who researches sharks for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told WJHG-TV in Panama City Beach that the recent attack there probably involved a bull shark in murky waters that may have confused the victim with a sea turtle. The man was hospitalized and remained in intensive care last month.

“It’s a very sad situation,” Carlson told the news outlet. “It was a likely mistake.”

Many Gulf Coast beach cities already monitor their waters for dangerous marine life and fly purple flags at beaches to warn visitors of animals, including sharks, stingrays and jellyfish. Scientists say precautionary steps — like avoiding swimming near fishermen or in cloudy waters — could become more important over the next decade.

“Everybody’s always saying there’s so many sharks around,” Naylor said. “Their numbers are coming back to where they should be.”