Sharks in Sussex: Five times they were spotted or confused for something else off the coast

Video footage emerged of what appeared to be shark fin off the coast at East Worthing on Saturday evening (October 7).

Toby Benjamin, 55, was at the beach with his wife and daughter at the time of the sighting. The writer and lecturer from Worthing has since been told by experts that what he saw was more likely to be a resting seal.

Despite common belief, sharks do appear around coastal locations in the UK – with the elasmobranch fish spotted on more than one occasion in Sussex.

According to sharktrust.org, more than 40 species of sharks exist in the UK – ‘including some of the fastest, rarest, largest and most highly migratory in the world’.

The most common are basking sharks which, though huge, are not a threat to humans and feed on plankton.

The website does state that ‘you’re very unlikely to encounter’ a shark during a trip to the beach.

Unlikely doesn’t mean impossible, though.

Here are six times sharks were spotted off the coast of Sussex or confused for something else:

Friends ‘swim with shark’ off Hastings coast

Two friends believe they swam next to a shark off the coast of Hastings without realising it, in June 2021.

Tatjana Lawrence and Andrew Larkin went for a swim near Rock-a-Nore at about 10.30am on Tuesday, June 22. Once they were back on the beach, the pair noticed a fin above the water which they believed was a basking shark.

Andrew suffered a cut to his ankle while he was in the sea which he thought was caused by rocks but, after spotting the fin, he wondered if it was caused by the shark.

Tatjana was still unsure whether they had spotted a shark until another sighting was reported off the coast of Bexhill on Tuesday evening.

She added: “I guess we’ll never know.” Read the full story here.

‘Never seen anything like this’

As mentioned before, a sighting was reported off the coast at Bexhill on the same day.

Tom Hunt was visiting his parents in Bexhill when he spotted what appeared to be a shark’s fin above the water.

He said he has been coming to Bexhill since he was a child as his parents live in the flats facing the sea in Knole Road, but said he has ‘never seen anything like this’.

After spotting the fin from his parents’ flat, he went down to the seafront and took a video of what he believed was a basking shark.

Tom said he could see the animal for another half an hour or so as it slowly made its way to Hastings.

Photographer goes viral with picture of paddle boarder and a huge shark

Hastings seems to be a popular place for sharks.

A young Hastings photographer caused a media sensation after taking a picture of a huge shark cruising past a paddle boarder in February, last year.

Wildlife photographer Michael Amos, aged 21, captured the striking image when working on his portfolio in Cornwall.

It went viral on social media and was featured in the online editions of several national newspapers, including the Mail, the Sun and the Mirror.

See the picture here.

'Shark' seen by dog walker in East Preston - but experts think it was something else

A reported sighting of a shark in East Preston in September 2022 was disputed by experts.

Rustington resident Ben Colbourne was walking his dog at the end of Botany Close and Pigeonhouse Lane, just before 9am, when he noticed what appeared to be shark fin. Ben said it ‘seemed to be a dorsal fin rather than a seal’ but was confused why the fish wasn’t moving.

Local experts believe that because the object was fixed rather than floating – and not being affected by the waves laterally or vertically – this would suggest it was a fixed object attached to the seabed. The object was in line with the wooden groyne which means it could be the remains of a broken port lateral marker post.

Click here to read the full story.

Sighting of 'Great White Shark' in West Sussex 'tip of outflow pipe'

A photographer standing on the beach at Goring-by-Sea believed he saw 'Great White Shark' off the coast at Ferring in February last year. But this was refuted by a local harbourmaster.

The beachgoer is said to have followed the 'sea creature' which was 30 yards from the shore when it surfaced, and 'watched it emerge from the water again 60 yards out'.

However, according to Littlehampton Harbour, the 'fin' was actually the end of the Ferring Outfall pipe.