A wayward shark has become an unlikely celebrity in South Korea, drawing massive crowds, earning plaudits from the local mayor and even moving the stock market.<\/p>\n
The predator – believed to be a bull shark – popped up in an artificial waterway in the port city of Busan on South Korea’s southeast coast this month.<\/p>\n
Coast guard boats tried to guide the animal back to the sea by spraying water on it, but the shark – affectionately nicknamed ‘Bukhangi’ by fans after the port – did not budge.<\/p>\n
And while authorities wonder what to do next, the 3.5-metre visitor and the crowds it has drawn have provided an unexpected boon to the local economy.<\/p>\n
Sales of shark-shaped ice cream bars jumped nearly 30 percent at nearby convenience stores.<\/p>\n
Busan Mayor Chun Jae-soo has thanked the shark for publicity that would otherwise have cost “trillions”.<\/p>\n
In tribute to its contributions, Bukhangi was elected an honorary public relations ambassador for the city with a stonking 91 percent of the vote.<\/p>\n
Others are cashing in – shares in The Pinkfong Company, the studio behind the viral “Baby Shark” song, briefly surged more than seven percent.<\/p>\n
Bull sharks are usually found in subtropical and tropical waters.<\/p>\n
Sharks venturing into South Korean waters is “not common at all”, said Kim Jin-koo, a professor of global fisheries at Pukyong National University.<\/p>\n
“As water temperatures around South Korea have risen, it appears to have moved closer to the country’s coast,” Kim said.<\/p>\n
The fish’s fame has also been accompanied by a flood of false rumours.<\/p>\n
A few days after its appearance, authorities said that a second fish had been spotted in the area – prompting some social media users to suggest it was Bukhangi’s child and share AI-generated images purporting to show the pair.<\/p>\n
An official at Busan’s park policy division told AFP that no additional sharks have been spotted since Bukhangi’s appearance.<\/p>\n
They also said authorities would make another attempt at moving the shark on Friday.<\/p>\n
The shark joins a list of unlikely animal celebrities in South Korea — most notably Neukgu, a young wolf that escaped from a zoo in April.<\/p>\n
The lost pup spent nine days on the lam before being recaptured.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A wayward shark has become an unlikely celebrity in South Korea, drawing massive crowds, earning plaudits from the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":616229,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[111,139,69,147,406],"class_list":["post-616228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-science","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=616228"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616228\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/616229"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=616228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=616228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=616228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}