Huge great white, tiger sharks seen off Shoal Bay, Nelson Bay at Port Stephens

The golden sand and iconic blue water is what attracts holiday-makers to Port Stephens. But reports of a few giant sharks off its family-friendly beaches have sparked debate.

Great white sharks are common along the Port Stephens coastline, but some larger predators inside the harbour have sparked debate.

The chatter on the sand is echoing the keyboard clatter on social media – and of the tens of thousands flocking to the pristine waters of Port Stephens for the first Covid-free summer in years, just a handful of them appear to be at the centre of conversations.

Most could be classed as locals, at least two are estimated as four metres long and all have caused ripples travelling much further than the golden sands of the Blue Water Wonderland.

The first is said to be a huge great white shark which “bumped” a jetskier just 60 metres – or a run and dive – off the eastern end of Shoal Bay Beach on New Year’s Day.

The following day, a tiger shark also estimated at four metres in length is said to have had an interaction with a kayaker about 100 metres off Fly Point, on the eastern end of Nelson Bay.

Add those large, predatory fish to the three-metre great white reportedly seen even closer to shore in the middle of Shoal Bay and the two-metre shark – species unknown – off Bagnalls Beach, to the west of Nelson Bay, in the days since News Years’, and the talk is not as calm as the salt water lapping up inside the popular harbour.

Reports of large great white sharks only metres off the sand of Shoal Bay Beach were made in consecutive days. Picture: Supplied

Many say it is nothing out of the ordinary – even excluding the tired “who would have thought, sharks in the ocean” comments are a bevy of locals who wash the concern away like salt and sand under a cold shower.

That includes old timers like John “Stinker” Clarke, a retired schoolteacher more renowned as a fisherman and author of historical pieces about Port Stephens and its beauty.

Shoal Bay Beach looking east. A three-metre shark was seen in the middle of the beach a day after a four-metre great white shark was reported to have “nudged” a jetski on the western end.

“Personally, I wouldn’t bother about them at all,” Mr Clarke says.

“I mean, I wouldn’t even get out of the water.

“No one has been killed by a shark [in or near Port Stephens] in over 250 years, so I reckon we are pretty safe.”

The closest to being killed is probably Anna Bay local Lisa Mondy, who found herself inside the mouth of a giant great white shark while wakeboarding on the Hawks Nest side of Port Stephens in 2011.

Shark attack survivor Lisa Mondy is now swimming with great whites. Picture by Peter Lorimer

Ms Mondy was attacked twice by the shark – estimated at four metres like the predator on the southern side of Port Stephens a few days ago – and survived horrific injuries.

But at a time when Port Stephens needs as many people enjoying themselves on the Tomaree Peninsula as possible, some are also questioning the timing of the reports as the small coastal towns, smashed by the pandemic and lockdowns, attempt to rebuild.

It did enough for Port Stephens Council to spend some time carefully researching data and speaking with experts before commenting.

Because although it may be scuttlebutt, the thousands of comments on community forums online is damaging nonetheless.

But even then, council would not comment on what it may – or may not – have done following the very public sightings of the huge sharks.

A juvenile great white shark at Port Stephens. Picture: Al McGlashan.

Instead, it prepared a carefully-worded reply stating council had authority over beaches outside patrolled areas, such as Shoal Bay and Nelson Bay beaches, and had the authority to “close access to beaches and would do so on the advice from other beach authorities”.

The council would not be drawn on whether such advice had been sought this week.

Port Stephens is a renowned great white shark “nursery”, especially south along Stockton Bight and north along Hawks Nest Beach.

Mr Clarke said there were so many sharks in the 1800s and early 1900s, a specifically-built plant at Pindimar on the northern edge of the harbour processed the carcasses off over 25,000 sharks before it shut because it had fished the place out.

A great white shark, estimated to be over four metres long, off the coast of Port Stephens. Picture: Lindsay Moller

The official protecting of the great white shark, and to a lesser extent the grey nurse shark, in the 1980s has allowed populations of the species to firstly rebuild and, now, flourish.

And although there have been a steady number of “attacks” along the NSW coast, there has been no spike at Port Stephens. In fact, it is to the contrary.

And that is despite detectors off Hawks Nest pinging tagged and released great whites and bull sharks almost daily.

“There are certain places you just don’t go, like boulders at Yacaaba [headland], but other than that you are safe,” one long-term surfer and fisherman said on condition of anonymity.

“You regularly see a fin – and sometimes they are big enough to make you paddle in for half an hour or so – but you have to be so incredibly unlucky it is seriously not even worth thinking about.”