High above Sydney’s beaches, drones seek one of the world’s deadliest predators, scanning for the flick of a tail, the swish of a fin or a shadow slipping through the swell.

Australia’s oceans are teeming with sharks, with great whites topping the list of species that might fatally chomp a human.

Undeterred, Australians flock to the sea in huge numbers — with a 2024 survey showing nearly two-thirds of the population made a total of 650 million coastal visits in a single year.

Many beach lovers accept the risks.

When a shark killed surfer Mercury Psillakis off a northern Sydney beach in September, his grief-stricken family called it “a tragic and unavoidable accident”.

Increasingly crowded waters and rising ocean temperatures that appear to be swaying sharks’ migratory patterns may be

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