Residents and visitors, beware: so-called "cocaine sharks" are circling the coasts of Florida, and scientists aren't sure if they're going away any time soon.
Marine biologist Tom Hird began investigating what's happening to piles of cocaine that end up dumped in the ocean and will present his findings on the Discovery Channel show Cocaine Sharks as part of Shark Week in 2023.
Tom tells Live Science that fishermen tipped him off to the odd behavior of the sharks, so he decided to check it out for himself. He said, "The deeper story here is the way that chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and illicit drugs are entering our waterways — entering our oceans — and what effect that they then could go on to have on these delicate ocean ecosystems."
On a dive, he witnessed the behavior firsthand. From hammerhead sharks who swam right at him to sharks that began to swim in circles, apparently fixating on an object that didn't appear, he's now worried about the sharks in question.
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Tom concludes, "We have no idea what [cocaine] could do to the shark. So we can’t even say well this is a baseline and go from here."
There is more in the video.
