Pafos Press 16 September 2024
A shark spotted in Cyprus travelled all the way to... Italy.
According to researchers at the Marine and Environmental Research (MER) Lab, it is a two-metre male longfin mako shark that was tagged with a satellite transmitter when it was caught as bycatch on surface longlines off Cyprus.
According to a post by the Elife Project, investigators today received a signal from Italy, about 1,000 kilometers away from where he was originally spotted.
It is noted that mako is the fastest shark in the world, while in the Mediterranean it is considered a species in immediate danger of extinction by IUCN (Critically Endangered).
The transmitter was placed off Paphos and five months later it was located in the Adriatic Sea. Through this satellite transmitter they will receive information about the depth it swam, temperature, etc. and will understand more about its ecology.
According to the same information, it is the first time we receive information in Cyprus about a species with a satellite transmitter and one of the very few in the eastern Mediterranean.
It is noted that the Elife Project is a European program that aims to reduce the bycatch of sharks and their mortality.
