Beaches closed after three shark attacks in just 24 hours

Australian Community Media

A man was bitten in Manly on Monday January 19, 2026, just hours after an 11-year-old boy escaped with a clean bite into his surfboard at Dee Why. A day earlier, a 12-year-old was rushed to hospital in a critical condition after sustaining significant injuries to his lower limbs from a shark bite in Nielson’s Park. This video includes ACM-produced voiceover powered by AI.

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00:00Three separate shark attacks within the space of just 24 hours caused alarm for beachgoers

00:05in Sydney. A man was bitten in Manly on Monday, January 19th, 2026, just hours after an 11-year-old

00:14boy escaped with a clean bite into his surfboard at DY. A day earlier, a 12-year-old was rushed

00:21to hospital in a critical condition after sustaining significant injuries to his lower

00:26limbs from a shark bite in Nielsen's Park. In response, the Northern Beaches Council has

00:32closed all its beaches for 48 hours, as jet skis and drones are sent out to monitor the

00:38waters for sharks.

00:41Sydney experienced its wettest day since 1988 on Sunday, January 18th, 2026, with 127 millimetres

00:50of rain falling in just 24 hours. Ocean water has been churned by the recent heavy rainfall,

00:58causing extremely turbid and brackish conditions, which is an ideal environment for bull sharks.

01:04But they are a large predator and they feed in very close to shore. So, I mean, they feed

01:10in a lot of different areas, but they do come in and feed on fish that are very close to

01:14the shore. So, it's more a matter of us being in their way and they're feeding around in

01:19areas where there's a lot of fish. You know, I mean, a kicking foot, whether you're sitting

01:25on a surfboard or jumping in off the rocks, you get a flash of white, they just do a taste

01:30and we get very badly injured by that because, you know, if you're going to go for a piece of

01:37fish, you've got to go fast and you've got to go hard. And they've got these unbelievably sharp

01:43serrating teeth, which means that they cause a lot of damage, which is why these poor guys have

01:48been hurt so badly.

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