9. In 1942, America’s spy masters go to war with sharks.
In 1942, the United States was engaged in total warfare. As well as its pilots and sailors fighting in the Atlantic, they were also engaged in the Pacific. Ships were being sunk and planes shot down. And men who weren’t killed outright were still in danger, not least from sharks. America’s military leaders recognized this and so the Navy launched a major project aimed at keeping its men safe from sharks.
The Naval investigation – which was actually led by the secret Office of Strategic Services, the predecessor of the CIA – brought together the nation’s leading shark experts. As well as the Navy’s own scientists, the finest minds of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, Scripps Institute of Oceanography, the University of Florida Gainesville and the American Museum of Natural History were tasked with designing an effective shark repellent. In the end, they came up with “Shark Chaser”. The scientists announced that it was “the answer to the threat of man-eating sharks, the scavengers which infest all tropical waters of the world”.
The Navy began using the OSS’s Shark Chaser and continued to do so until the 1970s. However, it was not so effective. Indeed, modern experts believe it would have had no effect on sharks. Far more useful was the advice the Navy issued to its men in March 1944, teaching them how to stay safe in shark-infested waters and fend off attacks. Sadly, of course, shark attacks continued to occur, albeit rarely, most notably with the sinking of the U.S.S. Indianapolis in July 1945.