Shark Kills Surfer

French news website The Local (www.thelocal.fr) reported that 32-year-old Mathieu Schiller was surfing in a heavy swell at Boucan Canot beach just north of popular tourist resort town St Gilles when the shark hit.

Witnesses said they saw a "surfer in difficulty and then a pool of blood", the report said. Apparently surfers in the water with him managed to get him onto his surfboard, but a set came through and he disappeared. Emergency services are still searching for the body.

A red warning flag for big swell had been hoisted on the beach of Boucan Canot, which bans bathers from entering the water, but does not ban watersport activity. However, in an emergency meeting held on Monday, the red flag now bans all activity in the water.

According to a translation from Reunion website reunion.orange.fr prefect Michel Lalande said the series of deadly attacks required immediate and emergency attention. In June, a 31-year-old man died surfing at the same spot. The latest death brings to four the number of shark incidents in Reunion this year.

"This repetition of deadly attacks requires public authorities, in consultation with the mayor of St. Paul to take emergency measures," said Lalande, going on to outline two immediate measures starting Tuesday, 20 September.

All open-water activity (surfing, body boarding, kite-surfing, diving) will be prohibited within 300 metres of a red flag, and a report based on research into dangerous species of sharks in the area must be made be available within three days.

According to the translation, world champion bodyboarder and friend Amaury Lavernhe, who was in the water with Schiller, has been actively campaigning for local government to take the increase in shark attacks more seriously, and it appears that harsh words where spoken at the emergency meeting, which included the mayor of St Paul, Huguette Bello.

Lalande regretted "the hot reaction" of the mayor, the report said.

The prefect said he had asked the Director of Environment, Spatial Planning and Housing (IEB) to propose a report within three days of studying whether conditions where attracting dangerous species of sharks such as tigers, mako and bull sharks. He stressed that "It's not a shark hunt. These are samples that I will establish the conditions. I will rely on professional expertise and the legal framework."

Schiller was French bodyboarding champion in 1994 and European team champion in 1995. Between 2004 and 2007 he worked as a lifeguard on Reunion. He opened his surf school, the "Surf Boucan S'Cool" at Boucan Canot in 2008.

La Reunion, which sits to the east of Madagascar in the Indian ocean, is considered an 'overseas department' of France with a population of about 800,000.