12/12/2025
Number 3 in the series of Voices of Extinction
“Aloha!”
My name is Kawika, but you can call me Dave. Im an oceanic whitetip shark and spend most of my time in the waters around the big Island of Hawaii. I’m a pelagic, or open- ocean species, constantly swimming over deep- ocean waters. My species live in sub-tropical to tropical waters all around the world. Fifty years ago, my species was considered one of the most common large vertebrates in the ocean.
If you ever saw the movie Jaws, the fisherman Quint talks about the sailors on the Indianapolis getting eaten by my kind. The sailors fell overboard or abandoned ship during an attack by a submarine during World War II. Like the great white shark in the movie, we were cast in a negative light as “man eaters.” Its believed most of the sailors died of drowning or hypothermia, but some of my cousins were there. They called them shark infested waters, but we think its more accurate to say shark inhabited!
We are called Carcharhinus longimanus, in Greek for Sharp-nosed, and in Latin for long hands. That’s because we have long pectoral fins that allow us to be highly mobile and maneuverable.
Unfortunately, the demand for our fins for shark fin soup have led to a huge decline in our population. Bycatch in the tuna fisheries have also killed hundreds of thousands of my kind. In the Pacific Ocean, scientists believe that less than 5% of Oceanic Whitetips still swim.
Luckily, I spend most of my time in Hawaii. It is illegal to fish for sharks here, and the deep waters off the islands, and the islands to the north in the Paphanaumokuakea National Marine Monument provide ideal habitat and feeding grounds. These protected waters ban commercial fishing and are prime nesting and pupping habitat for albatross, sea turtles and monk seals. There are also large schools of tuna fish, without the hooks and nets set in international waters, there is no risk that I will get captured. It’s a beautiful place!
This year we were also placed under the highest protection allowed for trade under International Convention. Called CITES – the Convention on the International Trade of Endangered Species, Appendix I makes it illegal to trade my fins. We are protected as Threatened under the Endangered Species Act, which also protects our habitat and affords other protection under what is called the Blanket Rule.
In Hawaii divers love to see me and take photographs but they do no harm.
Unfortunately, my species is now at risk under the Trump Administration through proposed rules to weaken the Endangered Species Act, and allow fishing in the National Marine Monument.
I need your help to maintain federal protection under the ESA by adding your voice before December 22nd. Please help and keep me swimming!