Community Corner

Great White Shark Headed Toward Sarasota Coast?

A great white shark off the Florida Gulf Coast is on a course headed toward Sarasota, according to research data.

A great white shark is lurking off the Sarasota coast, research findings are showing.

The 14-foot, 2,300-pound great white shark named "Katherine" was tagged off the coast of Nantucket last August. It is now on a path toward Sarasota according to geolocation data collected by non-profit OCEARCH.

Watch the video of shark’s tagging above.

Find out what's happening in Sarasotawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Katherine the great white has been off Florida’s Gulf Coast Continental Shelf since June, according to the OCEARCH website. But she has been inching ever closer to the Tampa Bay area since the start of July, as of the last few recorded locations. 

Great white sharks are considered apex marine predators, having very few oceanic predators.

Find out what's happening in Sarasotawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

What’s behind the shark’s naming?

“[Katherine] is named in honor of Katherine Lee Bates, one of the Cape’s greatest natives and writer of ‘America the Beautiful,’” a tagger said during the shark’s marking in the video filmed in August 2013.

OCEARCH is a non-profit organization providing open source shark data.


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here