Shark sightings off West Australian coast triple in a year

Shark sightings off the coast of Western Australia (WA) have almost tripled in the last year.

The WA Department of Fisheries found that between January and July 2016, 1,460 sharks were sighted or detected by satellite receivers off WA's coast - compared to 534 in the same time period in 2015.

The escalation of sightings came months after surfer Ben Gerring and diver Doreen Collyer were killed by suspected Great White sharks in June just days apart, bringing the total number of shark-related deaths in WA to 14 since 2000.

A Department of Fisheries spokesperson told Fairfax Media that the number of sightings and detections could have been inflated by the particularly bountiful salmon season in WA this year.

The figures also showed a huge spike in sightings in late 2015 with 958 sightings in October 2015 alone, more than double the number of sightings reported in the next highest recorded month (467 in December 2015).

Lisa Clark, a shark response unit spokeswoman, said the number of sightings per month varied depending on the number of people using the beaches.

"Multiple detections can occur while a shark remains in range (500 meters) of a receiver, so the number of detections does not represent the number of sharks," Clark told Fairfax on Friday.

Of the sharks detected since WA launched its Shark Smart website in 2014, the bronze whaler shark has been most prominent with 2,129 events, followed by the tiger shark with 1,308 and white sharks with 530 events.

A system of 25 satellite trackers along the WA coast, 18 of which are off the coast of capital Perth and other metropolitan areas, send notifications to authorities every time a shark is detected. Endit