A 39-year-old spearfisher has died after being bitten by a shark on the Great Barrier Reef, the second fatal incident in Australia in little more than a week, and the third in Australia in 2026.
Michael Jensz, from Mount Sheridan near Cairns, was spearfishing with friends at Kennedy Shoal, south of Cairns, on Sunday when he was bitten.
Kennedy Shoal is a shallow coral reef area popular with recreational fishers and scuba divers, also known locally for the 1894 wreck of the four-masted schooner Lady Bowen.
Jensz was pulled from the water by friends and taken by boat to Hull Heads, where paramedics were waiting, but were unable to save him.
Queensland Police Inspector Elaine Burns told reporters that Jensz had ‘died from a critical head injury’, adding that his friends on board the boat had witnessed the incident at close range.
‘I would assume they would be pretty traumatised,’ she said. ‘That’s quite a terrifying thing to see happen right in front of you.’
The species of shark responsible has not been identified, but Australian media have reported that bull sharks had been seen regularly in the area before the attack.
Gerard Pike, owner of a Cairns-based fishing charter, told reporters that he was fishing a few miles from Kennedy Shoal when a group of bull sharks took part of his catch
‘We were chasing Spanish mackerel and had one eaten by a pack of six of them, four metres off the edge of the boat,’ Pike said. ‘We were not going to dip our toes in the water.’
The fatality is the second in Australian waters in little over a week, and the third so far in 2016, but the incidents are distant from each other, and not related.
On 16 May, Perth spearfisher Steven Mattaboni was killed by what is thought to be a great white shark off Rottnest Island in Western Australia, on the other side of the Australian continent.
In January, 12-year-old Nico Antic died from injuries sustained in a suspected bull shark attack in Sydney Harbour.
The two fatalities have led to discussions in Australian media around the risks associated with spearfishing in waters where sharks are present, with at least one Queensland MP calling for sharks to be culled.
Marine scientists pushed back against those proposals, however, with marine biologist Professor Jodie Rummer of James Cook University noting that there was little evidence that previous culling programmes had reduced the risk of shark attacks.
Professor Rummer also said that removing apex predators from the marine environment could have far-reaching and damaging consequences for ecosystems along the Great Barrier Reef.
Australia records more shark incidents than almost any other country, although fatal attacks remain rare.
According to the Australian Shark-Incident Database, 1,285 shark incidents have been recorded between 1791 and 2025, 259 of which have resulted in fatalities.
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