EW YORK (AP) — If you think you’re safe avoiding sharks by simply staying out of the water, think again.
A few species of epaulette sharks have evolved to move their pectoral fins in the front and pelvic fins in the back to plod along outside the water at low tide. Just to be perfectly clear: That’s on land.
Relax, none are going to chase you home. They’re just wriggling.
“They’re not sprinting. There are no ankle-biters coming to get anybody. It’s just this fascinating behavior taking place,” says wildlife conservationist and biologist Forrest Galante.
So-called walking sharks of Papua New Guinea are among the stars of this year’s Shark Week, with 25 hours of programming dedicated to all varieties of the apex predators on the Discovery Channel and streaming on discovery+ .
Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson will be the week’s recurring master of ceremonies — a first such role in the 34 years of Shark Week. Celebrities with shows include the stars of truTV’s “Impractical Jokers,” the cast of “Jackass” and comedian Tracy Morgan making his Shark Week debut.
Morgan teams up with shark experts — including his 9-year-old shark-crazy daughter, Maven Sonae, who has a 20,000-gallon fish tank in her backyard — to identify the craziest and most ferocious in the ocean. “She’s my best co-star ever,” says Morgan. “She’s always been into marine life since she was a baby.”
The programing includes a look at giant makos off the Azores, great whites off Cape Cod and in South Africa, hammerheads in The Bahamas, mysterious cold-water sharks in Alaska and tiger sharks in Turks and Caicos.
