On Pings and Panic

On May 20—just before the Memorial Day holiday that draws thousands of boaters and beach-goers to the water—the research firm Ocearch announced that it had tracked a great white shark deep in Long Island Sound for the first time. A tracking device, the researchers said, showed the nearly 10-foot-long animal swimming off the coast of Greenwich, Connecticut.

What happened next was the kind of Jaws-meets-Sharknado media frenzy that makes marine researchers cringe. CBS News gave beachgoers plenty to fuel their imaginations, reporting that the animal weighed more than 500 pounds. The harbormaster that it would be unusual for a great white to be so far west in the sound, adding that people likely had nothing to worry about, because the shark was “probably well fed.” ABC News covered the story on its “World News Tonight” television program, calling the ping from the tracking device “an ominous alert.” Putting a fine point on the media message, NBC’s “Today Show” urged beachgoers to “stay safe this Memorial Day.”