'Very uncommon': Dead great white shark washes up on Cape Breton shoreline

Dead great white shark found in Cape Breton A great white shark has been found dead on the shoreline in North Sydney, N.S. Kyle Moore reports.

For the second time in less than two weeks, a dead great white shark has washed up on a shoreline in the Maritimes.

This time, the discovery was made in North Sydney, N.S.

Locals who found the large fish on Wednesday quickly reported it to the Marine Animal Response Society (MARS).

The shark was then carefully transferred to North Sydney's Northern Yacht Club by a local boat owner.

"We had a boat go out and pick it up. It drifted in on the shore," said Dave Buis, the acting commander at the yacht club. "We supplied a fish net to corral it in. They didn't want to do too much damage to it."

Buis estimated the shark to be about six feet in length. He says it's a concerning sight to see in his area.

Warren Joyce, the aquatic fisheries technician with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO), says the shark is a female and appears to be a juvenile.

He says it's rare to have a great white shark wash up along a shoreline.

"We might hear maybe a few cases a year. Typically, they're porbeagle or blue sharks. For a white shark, this is very uncommon," said Joyce.

Joyce says the shark was picked up by DFO Wednesday evening and will be transferred to Halifax, where a necropsy -- a test that can help determine how the shark died -- will be completed.

He says samples will also be collected for scientific analysis.

As far as why a dead great white shark would wash ashore, Joyce says there could be many reasons behind that.

"It could be a natural death, it could be from accidentally being caught in commercial fishing gear, it could be a number of reasons," he said.

Laura Brophy was one of the first people to come face-to-face with the shark along North Sydney's shoreline.

"I was just in awe, really. It's such a majestic creature and even seeing it in that state, it was still a beautiful thing to see," she said. "They're really special, I think."

Brophy is a local diver and was called to try and help rescue the shark, but by the time she arrived, it had already died.

She says she's never personally come across a great white shark during a dive, but knows many other divers who have.

"I've never seen one while diving but I know several divers in Halifax have had several shark encounters, but they don't seem to bother divers too much," said Brophy.

This shark discovery comes just over a week after another great white shark was found washed up along New Brunswick's shoreline.

In that case, experts did not find any evidence of it being caught in fishing gear or evidence of a boat strike.

Joyce told CTV News last week that after speaking with colleagues in Cape Cod, it's possible the shark had been hunting too close to the shallows and was washed up with the tide.