Shark Attacks Reach Record-Breaking High in California

Following a recent spate of shark encounters, attacks, and incidents in California, experts have announced that 2025 was a record-breaking year for shark-related activity.

Speaking with SFgate, Peter Tira of the Department of Fish and Wildlife, said that there were 10 “incidents” in 2025, the “highest total number of shark incidents recorded in a single year.” Tira added: “However, there were only three incidents with injuries last year, far below the highest year, which was 1974 with seven injuries confirmed.”

And just two weeks into 2026, a surfer was attacked by a shark in Northern California.

On Tuesday morning, Tim Civik, 26, was surfing the Gualala River mouth in Mendocino County, when a shark (species unconfirmed as of now, but likely a great white) launched him from his surfboard, piercing its teeth in his thigh, and snapping his board in half.

“I heard from them that it hit the surfer and the surfboard, threw the surfer up in the air a bit, and broke the board in half,” South Coast Fire Protection District Chief Jason Warner said. “The shark latched on to half of the board and [was] kind of thrashing it around.”  

And before that, there was the highly-publicized death of Erica Fox. The 55-year-old triathlete was in the water at Pacific Grove when she went missing from her swimming group. Her body was found in Santa Cruz County, and the coroner determined the cause of death to be “sharp and blunt force injuries and submersion in water due to a shark attack.”

According to the International Shark Attack File, the numbers for 2024 were much lower. “There were three unprovoked attacks in California, including one in which a surfboard was punctured,” they reported. But they also added: “Globally, surfers accounted for 33% of all attacks last year.”

For a list of documented shark attacks in California from 1950 until the present, per the Department of Fish and Wildlife, see here.

So, why so many shark encounters in 2025? It could just be that time of year.

Per Paul Kanive, president of the California White Shark Project, specifically regarding Northern California: “This is the time of year where they’re still lingering there. They start to filter out to the open ocean around … January, February, March.” 

And yet, the chances of getting attacked by a shark – in California or anywhere else – remain extremely rare. Mosquitoes, lightning, and constipation fatalities are higher.

As Kanive noted:

“We’re not on their menu. If we were something that they want … it would be so easy for them to go after us.”