Shark terrorising Egyptian resort 'killed by drunken Serb who jumped on its head':

The hoax taking the internet by storm

By Daniel Bates
Last updated at 3:32 AM on 22nd December 2010

A hoax account of a Serbian tourist killing the shark which terrorised divers at the Egyptian resort of Sharm-el-Sheikh has become an Internet sensation.

According to the 'reports', Dragan Stevic is said to have drunkenly hurled himself off of a diving board and into the Red Sea where he landed bottom-first onto the head of the waiting predator, killing it instantly.

But immediately questions were raised about the authenticity of the story with some commentators claiming it came from the Serbian version of satirical U.S. newspaper The Onion.

Rather than a whitetip shark, the picture on the website of the Macedonian International News Agency is said to be that of a basking shark, which only eats plankton.

Truth: The image first run in the MINA report about Dragan Stevic of Serbia killing the man-eating shark at Sharm-el-Sheikh. The picture was actually taken last year and posted online by carolinabeachtoday.com

And instead of the Red Sea, the predator in question was washed up thousands of miles away off the coast of Duck in North Carolina at some point last year.

The story was picked up by the MINA, a Macedonian news agency, and the New York Post and went viral before bloggers pointed out the accoun twas riddled with holes.

The MINA report said that officials in Egypt had already begun called Mr Stevic a national hero for saving the tourism season and given him the nickname ‘Shark-el-Sheikh’.

After killing the predator and swimming back to the beach he was said to be in hospital recovering from alcohol poisoning.

The fake report included an account from his ‘friend’ Milovan Ubirapa, who supposedly witnessed the incident.

Holiday terror: The Sinai resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, where at least one shark has terrorised holidaymakers over the last few weeks

He said Mr Stevic had been drinking all night when he went to the beach for a swim and decided to jump off the high diving board.

‘Dragan climbed on the jumping board, told me to hold his beer and simply ran to jump. There was no time for me to react or to try to stop him, he just went for it,’ he was quoted as saying.

‘Dragan jumped high and plunged down to the sea, but didn’t make as much splash as we thought he would.’

But the writers on Carolinabeachtoday.com, which identified the picture of the shark, wrote: ‘Sorry Dragen, it was a hell of a story and we all wish it was true.

‘But don't give up, keep jumping off those piers, for someday...it might just be.’

The hoax story has made light of a serious incident which brought has caused Egypt deep anxiety.

Earlier this month the panic at Sharm el-Sheikh began when a shark tore the arm off an elderly German tourist, killing her almost immediately and sparking closure of the resort’s beaches.

The deadly attack came after oceanic white tip sharks mauled three Russians and a Ukrainian tourist at the same spot.

In one of the attacks a shark bit off an elderly woman's hand and tore off another woman's leg.

Dozens of holiday firms had cancelled diving and other water sports around the resort following the shark attacks whilst the Foreign Office issued a safety warning for British holidaymakers.

The incidents had been blamed on a ‘rogue’ oceanic whitetip shark and Egyptian authorities had paid for three international experts to fly in and investigate.