“He was just beyond the surf, and suddenly he screamed bloody murder and his head went under water and it came up again and he screamed something else and then he went down again. There was all this splashing around, and blood was flying all over the place. The fish kept coming back and hitting him again and again and again. That's the biggest ... fish I ever saw in my whole life, big as a ... station wagon.” This quote from one of Peter Benchley’s secondary characters is a description of an attack that he witnessed in the book, JAWS. JAWS is both an award winning novel and a terrifying horror film that keeps many people from putting a toe in the ocean, but is it credible and/or possible? In both the novel and the movie, a large great white shark or Carcharodon Carcharias terrorises a small community on the island of Amity, off the east coast of the United States. This shark seems to specifically attack humans and targets boats. At two points during JAWS, the shark is able to attack fishing boats, punch and bite holes in the sides of those boats, and even jumps onto a boat to attack people in the movie. This shark is also capable of breaking through stainless steel cages and pulling multiple air filled barrels under the water’s surface for extended periods of time. Is any of this, from being 25 feet long to being able to sink boats on its own true. This is what will be explored in this paper. Everything from possible causes to factual historical accounts will be covered by this paper. Though many will be doubtful, evidence suggests that every action and quality performed and possessed by the shark in JAWS is possible, even it being a freakish size of 25 feet, yet, it is so rare for any of these things to occur that they barely ever will and will most likely never happen together.

Supporting Research

If a JAWS-like situation was possible, then wouldn’t we have seen a major event by now. If someone is wondering about this same question, here is the answer. In 1916 there were a series of attacks off the shore of New Jersey that influenced a great fear of sharks on the East coast. A 7 and a half foot great white wreaked havoc on both an oceanic shoreline and a relatively small river. Within this series of attacks, 4 people fell victim to this overly aggressive shark and one Joseph Dunn, 12, survived but had major leg injuries. The shark was eventually caught by Michael Schleisser, 40, and John Murphy, 28, with 15 pounds of flesh and bone in its stomach after it attacked their boat. It was able to pull their 8 foot boat -with a motor- backwards using a net that they had thrown out.  This great white spent an extremely long period of time in fresh water which is abnormal for the species and it was much more aggressive than most other great whites. This is an example used by Dr. Sir Victor Coppleson in 1933 to propose the theory of “rogue sharks” or sharks that specifically target humans. Most sharks that are suspected to be rogue have almost unnatural characteristics. They are more aggressive and can usually do things that are abnormal for their species such as stay in a freshwater river for extended periods of time. According to the Museum of Unnatural Mystery, there was another attack: “In 1923 four miners were fishing off of New South Wales in Australia when a shark ripped a gaping hole in the bottom of their boat causing it to capsize. The shark ate one of the miners while the others watched.” (Krystek, 2009). This quote illustrates the possible power of the Carcharodon Carcharias. It was able to bite a hole in the side of a boat similarly to the scene in JAWS where the shark attacks Captain Quint’s ship, the Orca. The theory of “rogue sharks” is reinforced by these two accounts of great white attacks. The one that attacked the boat was much larger than the 7½’ shark that was responsible for the 1916 attacks and still not as big as the shark described in JAWS. These two attacks are fuel for the rogue shark theory and are factual historical accounts supported by other sites such as National Geographic. With the aggressive nature of these sharks and their brute strength, it is easy to see that the great white shark in JAWS could have pulled off most of the attacks in the way these sharks have.

To get a real perspective into the nature of an average great white or Carcharodon Carcharias, it is necessary to look at what makes it both a formidable predator and a misunderstood creature. From the University of Miami Shark Research section, in a project titled “Predatory Behavior of Great White Sharks,” the tactics of great white predation are explored. With most great whites, “Stalking is conducted from near the bottom, from sufficient depth to remain undetected during approach, and the attack launched vertically. This strategy maximizes a shark’s chance of catching a seal unaware, resulting in a fatal or incapacitating initial strike” (U.o.M., 2018). A tactic like this could have been used, like the shark in JAWS, to breach out of the water and land on boats or, such as in the attack scenes and movie cover, to attack from below in a stealthy yet effective manner. It is evident that this tactic was used as it is a natural hunting method. In a site entitled “Great white shark leaps out of sea and lunges at researcher.” an inexperienced outsider claims that a great white was trying to attack a man on a boat who was trying to tag the shark, but if a closer look is taken at the video, the great white is curious instead of aggressive. It is natural for a great white to stick its head above water and rotate for a few seconds to see what is going on on the surface. This one was defensive because of its close proximity to something it was curious about so it was ready to attack if need be. It would have probably stayed up longer if it didn’t have a boat sailing straight toward it. This shows the calm and curious nature of this particular shark rather than an aggressive one like one of the supposed rogue sharks or a stereotypical shark. Two different accounts by National Geographic describe shark attacks throughout the world and they point to the fact that shark attacks happen where the people are. Large amounts of people increase the likelihood of an attack and this is statistically supported. This means that people could be causing attacks more than overly aggressive sharks. This would support JAWS because the attacks took place in Amity’s vacation season. The Smithsonian oceanic educational site describes the 400,000,000 year history of the great white and shows how it has adapted into a supreme predator. It has more senses and better tuned senses than the average human. Great white sharks can, as adults, range in size from 14 to about 20 feet. There are exceptions such as Deep Blue, a large and docile great white that has a public fan group, or a 21 foot great white caught near Cuba in 1945. Due to pollution, overfishing, and shark finning, great white population has decreased dramatically meaning that sharks have more to fear from people than people do of them. Our threat could have a dangerous inverse effect that would make sharks attack more frequent. With all of the issues that we are unjustly pushing into the environment we are creating a food shortage for sharks that could make them more desperate andore likely to turn to unwary bathers and swimmers. From these evidences, it is clear to see that the shark from JAWS could possibly come to exist, but it would have to be extremely rare, like searching a vast ocean for one unique shark in a sea of atypical sharks.

To understand more about the movie and its relative realisticity, it is imperative to scrutinise its inspiration. JAWS had a multitude of events, people, and theories that led to this terrifying horror story. Peter Benchley, in the creation of his award winning novel, used plenty of historical influences to set up his plot line. Captain Quint, a fictitious character in JAWS found its inspiration in a Frank Mundus. He found fame in catching a 4,500 pound great white in 1964 and so became the perfect model for a fictitious shark hunter. Once again, the 1916 attacks, described above contributed to the one overly aggressive shark used in the story. The capability of a 7½ foot shark against a 25 foot shark allowed for Peter Benchley to make the shark more capable and devastating. The boat that was sunk in the ending scene of the movie, the Orca, was inspired by Frank Mundus’s boat the Cricket II.  The story was a complete horror sensation because, “There is nothing scarier or more fascinating than the intelligent monster...” (Shiffman, 2015). The movie was made to be a blockbuster horror film, but it became real for some people and pushed them away from the now hostile oceans. The inspirations for the movie, however, were genuine encounters, people, and historical accounts which is true with most fictitious stories. That they are based in fact. The movie and novel JAWS sprouted from a plethora of factors and deviated from them in only some circumstances. Every single actionperformed by the shark can be proven as scientifically accurate or can be historically shown in the events or studies that influenced JAWS.

The famous attacks off the coast of New Jersey in 1916, the attack on a miner’s fishing boat, studies of great white, Carcharodon Carcharias, predation, statistical analysis of shark attack locations, and the inspirations of JAWS can culminate to suggest that a series of shark attacks similar to those in JAWS are all possible yet exceedingly improbable. From what has been written in this paper, it is clear that nothing in JAWS that the shark has done is impossible but remote, though many may still not believe so.

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