Thanks to mermaids in Plettenberg Bay, NGO Shark Spotters were able to purchase a new set of wheels that’ll help their marine conservation missions mobilise and reach more young people amongst many other good things!
Plettenberg Bay, South Africa (15 January 2025)—The Plett chapter of Shark Spotters is riding a wave of gratitude thanks to a very special gift made possible by some extra-kind mermaids in their community.
A charity ball dubbed ‘The Mermaid Ball’ encouraged all the mermaids to trade the sea for a night of glitz and glamour. The ball-goers dressed to the nines and made sure to share extra dimes with Shark Spotters in mind; collective efforts that resulted in an incredible R120,000 raised for the NGO.
Thanks to the ‘sparkling success of a ball’, Plett Shark Spotters now have a dedicated vehicle to call their own and another way to mobilise their marine conservation efforts.
“This car is more than just transportation; it’s a symbol of hope, education, and ocean conservation,” the Plett Shark Spotters team shared.
The new wheels will help the team further ensure the safety of beachgoers, expand educational activities by reaching more young people and ultimately advance their capacity for research.
For those who don’t know, Shark Spotters does a lot more than deliver shark sightings. A proud shark safety and research organisation founded by Greg Bertish and Dave and Fiona Chudleigh, their work has been protecting both sharks and people for over 20 years.
Last year, they were the gracious winners of the prestigious NGO Award at the 2024 SANParks Kudu Awards; earned for their hard work in the fields of shark conservation, safety and education.
Their innovative work in the early 2000s was key to people reframing their understanding of sharks from sensationalist ‘scandals’ to animals that exist as part of an ecosystem that humans didn’t fully understand and in many cases still don’t.
The Shark Spotters’ approach has encouraged people to understand themselves as part of a much bigger ecological puzzle; providing coastal visitors and dwellers with objective information, accurate shark spotting from the spotters in their network, and responsible measures for public safety which have been deployed across Cape Town and Plett.
Their conservation work is vital to the entire ocean, while their safety-focused information for both sharks and humans has helped challenge harmful narratives surrounding mainstream shark discourse, especially through non-lethal mitigation strategies.