Can The Florida Man Survive Cocaine Sharks?
The famous Florida Man has been through a lot, but a potential new threat has scientists concerned and the public shocked. If you have a fear of sharks, then you have another thing coming. Watch out, Florida Man, here come cocaine sharks. Yes, you read that correctly. Experts have discovered there is a chance that sharks are getting high. How? By eating cocaine that is ending up in the Gulf of Mexico.
This investigation was popularized on Discovery Channel’s Shark Week. While the TV special is super popular, it can be known for including some BS to get views. So, is that all this is?
Recently, there has been an insane amount of cocaine found floating around in the ocean. The U.S. Coast Guard retrieved $275 million worth of illegal drugs as of July 2023, the majority of that found off the coast of the Florida Keys. Since sharks follow currents (and the floating coke will too), the odds of them running into these dumped narcotics are high. The question isn’t whether they will come into contact with these drugs. Because they will. What we need to know is whether they have any interest in messing with these drugs and how it affects them.
There are so many different breeds of sharks swimming through the Florida Keys, including bull sharks, tiger sharks, and hammerheads (fun!). Tom Hird, a marine biologist, and Tracy Fanara, an environmental scientist at the University of Florida, dove in the Keys on the hunt for these sharks, looking for abnormal behavior. The behavior they noticed was weird, but none of it could necessarily be directly linked back to cocaine use.
After the dive, the team experimented by dropping bales meant to look like the floating narcotics and fake birds to see which the sharks would go for. I mean, they had to have gone for the birds, right? Nope. Many sharks went for the dummy bales of cocaine, some taking bites.
After that, they dropped bales filled with fish powder, a substance that is meant to give the sharks a dopamine high, like humans when they inhale cocaine. Sure enough, the substance got the sharks riled up. Hird, a marine biologist on the investigation, compared it to how cats react to catnip. “It’s the next best thing [and] sets their brains aflame. It was crazy,” Hird said on Discovery Channel’s Cocaine Sharks.
Recently, Floridians who spend a good amount of time in the ocean have been worried about potential cocaine shark attacks. So far, in 2023, there have been sixteen shark attacks in Florida; five of those bites took place in the Keys. This number is tied with the five attacks that have taken place in New Smyrna Beach, the shark bite capital of the world.
Although I would love to leave that there and scare you, there were also sixteen shark attacks in Florida in 2022, four of them took place in the Keys. According to the evidence at hand, there is not a spike in shark attacks. So, the Discovery Channel’s TV Special is not necessarily BS at all. But even though these cocaine sharks likely exist, there is no hard evidence saying they are attacking anyone or are even affected by cocaine.
Truly, this investigation and its appearance on Shark Week does an amazing job of bringing another issue to light: humans are responsible for an insane amount of ocean pollution, including (but definitely not limited to) drugs. Efforts are constantly being made to end this, and although you've heard it before, I'll say it again: there is always something you can do to help.
Alright, now that you know what the hell a cocaine shark is, let’s put the science and the world-saving aside. In this hypothetical situation, the cocaine sharks are vicious, high as f*ck, and ready to attack. What gives the Florida Man a fighting chance? I present the following evidence. The Florida Man has single-handedly thrown a live gator through a Wendy’s drive-thru window, attempted time travel and crashed into a strip mall, threw a hot dog at a cop, attacked a woman with a machete wearing nothing but a cowboy hat, got arrested for trying to get an alligator drunk, attempted to shoot at a hurricane, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. In my opinion, the cocaine shark doesn't have sh*t on that. Long live the Florida Man.
Strike Out,
Morgan Harms
Boca Raton
Morgan Harms is a Content Writer for Strike Magazine Boca. She is a pisces mermaid with a love for the ocean. She spends her free time daydreaming, wave watching and blasting whatever music she’s into that day. You can reach her by email at morganjharms@gmail.com or on Instagram @morganjharms.
