Shark kills swimmer off Perth's Sorrento Beach

A man was killed by a shark while swimming off Sorrento Beach in Perth's northern suburbs on Friday morning, and searchers spent hours in the air and on the water without finding any trace of him.

Police said they were confident the swimmer had died as a result of the attack. Boats and helicopters searched the ocean off the beach for hours afterwards, according to a police statement. Officers would not say whether potential remains had been found. Witnesses described the swimmer as a man in his 60s, and police did not identify him further.

St John WA received reports of the attack at 10:15am local time, the ABC reported, and police have patrolled the beach since, with officers seen along the shoreline next to a red surfboard. Western Australia Police said a helicopter, Water Police officers, the RAC Rescue Helicopter and Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development Fisheries vessels conducted an extensive search of the area.

What beachgoers saw

Jacqui Rapaic was walking along the beach with a friend when the attack happened. She told the ABC she looked out to the ocean and saw a pool of blood. Rapaic said she believed two men had been swimming and that only one of them made it back to shore.

Russell James, who was at the beach when the shark alarm sounded, said police and ambulances had gathered by the water's edge near the groyne, with what appeared to be a couple of surfboards or paddle boards down by the sand.

Ryan Rowe, a local resident, reached the beach soon afterwards and was told by an onlooker that someone had been bitten by a shark. He told The West Australian that he could not believe how much blood had come out of a human body,.

Darrel Haythornthwaite told Nine Network television that the victim had been swimming with a friend who was left traumatised. The friend apologised and said he had not saved his mate, Haythornthwaite said, and he told the man there was nothing he could have done. Ingrid Mitchell, who swims at the beach daily, told Nine it was hard to watch someone be mauled in front of her.

Twelve kilometres of coast closed

The closure runs almost 12 kilometres, from Marmion to Iluka, and holds until at least noon on Saturday, the ABC reported. Authorities shut Sorrento Beach to swimmers after the attack. The City of Joondalup also closed Hillarys, Whitfords and Mullaloo beaches, according to the Western Australian government's SharkSmart website.

The City of Joondalup, the local authority that takes in Sorrento, said all of its beaches were closed because of the attack.

Three St John Ambulance crews were sent to the beach, one of them on a priority call. Emergency crews later stood down their ambulance operations as the effort shifted to a marine search.

Sorrento is a popular swimming spot about 20 kilometres north of Perth's central business district and just south of Hillarys marina, which has multiple restaurants and cafes. Surf Life Saving WA said the attack happened about 50 metres offshore.

What authorities have said

WA Premier Roger Cook said in a social media post that he was deeply saddened, calling the death a heartbreaking tragedy and saying his thoughts were with the victim's family and the first responders who attended. Hillarys MP Caitlin Collins, whose electorate includes Sorrento Beach, said the attack was deeply distressing for the community.

Sorrento Beach is a place so many of us love and an incident like this is incredibly difficult for everyone who spends time along our coastline.

Collins said her thoughts were with the victim's loved ones and everyone who witnessed the attack or was affected by it. She said she had spoken with the minister and that authorities were continuing to manage the situation, and she acknowledged the emergency services, police and surf lifesavers who attended the scene.

A member of the public reported seeing a 2.5-metre shark off the beach before the attack, the ABC reported. The state government's SharkSmart site listed two reports of shark sightings around the time of the attack, the first logged at 10.22am local time. The Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development, which is working with local authorities on the response, said it was investigating the reported shark incident.

The species of shark involved has not been officially identified, and police have not released the dead man's name or any further details about him.

Shark barrier removed in 2020

Part of Sorrento Beach once had a shark barrier. An enclosure co-funded by the state government and the City of Joondalup was approved in 2016 and taken out in 2020. Barriers are in place at Cottesloe, Coogee, Quinns Beach in Wanneroo and Bathers Beach in Fremantle, though some are seasonal and are not installed until October.

A second attack in four days

A surfer lost his foot and suffered serious leg injuries in a shark attack on Monday near Geraldton, about 400 kilometres north of Perth. The ABC identified him as Mel Ismail, 56, a Geraldton firefighter, and reported that he remains in hospital in a serious but stable condition. Friday's death followed that attack by four days.

Surf Life Saving WA had begun helicopter shark patrols on weekends a week before Friday's attack, ahead of the summer season, and daily patrols are not scheduled to begin until September 26.

Five fatal attacks this year

Five people have been killed by sharks in Australia this year, the Associated Press reported. Three spearfishing divers were killed off the Australian coast in three weeks over May and June, two of them in Western Australia and the third in Queensland, according to CBS News. Such incidents have become more common as Australia's population has grown and activities such as surfing and scuba diving have gained popularity.

Spearfisher Steven Mattaboni died after a shark attack off Rottnest Island in May, and another spearfisher, Daniel Turpin, died after an attack near Albany a few weeks later, according to the ABC.

In January, a 12-year-old boy died in hospital days after he was mauled by a bull shark in Sydney Harbour, one of four attacks recorded in two days that prompted officials to close dozens of the city's beaches. In June, a schoolteacher was mauled at Coogee, one of Sydney's most popular beaches and later described swinging a left hook at the shark before it dragged her underwater, CBS News reported.

The swimmer's death is the 24th fatal shark attack in Western Australia since 2000, 10 of them in the Perth metropolitan area and three of them this year, the ABC reported.

Australia has averaged between two and three fatal shark attacks a year since 2000, according to the Australian Shark Incident Database, a partnership of the Taronga Conservation Society Australia, Flinders University and the New South Wales state government. The International Shark Attack File, maintained by the University of Florida, has recorded more than 1,280 shark incidents around Australia since 1791, including more than 250 fatal incidents.