Hunt on for great white killer in Perth

  • 06/06/2016
Surfer Ben Gerring, 29, died on Friday night after being bitten by a shark (AAP)
Surfer Ben Gerring, 29, died on Friday night after being bitten by a shark (AAP)

Authorities in Western Australia are hunting a great white shark after it attacked and killed a diver.

A 60-year-old woman diving 2km from the Mindarie Marina in Perth died straight away after being attacked by a shark on Sunday -- the second incident in just under a week.

The shark was reportedly longer than the 5.3-metre rescue vessel on Sunday (local time).

She was swimming with a 43-year-old man.

"The man said that he felt something go past him and he turned around, he didn't see the shark at that stage but he felt it better to surface. When he surfaced he noticed a commotion in the water," says Inspector Danny Mulligan from Western Australia Police.

A rescue boat wedged itself between the man and the shark, and he was able to get back into his own boat -- that's when he noticed the woman had suffered fatal injuries, police say.

Fisheries officers have been preparing to capture the shark involved in yesterday's attack off Mindarie Marina, The Australian reports.

It follows an attack on 29-year-old surfer Ben Gerring, who was bitten by a shark on Tuesday and died of his injuries on Friday night, BBC reports.

A day later, a 4.2-metre white pointer shark was killed by fisheries officers at the surf beach where Gerring was attacked.

The Australian Greens heavily oppose baiting sharks because of fatal attacks.

Greens MP Lynn McLaren says, "There's also no evidence that one shark that's involved in an attack will repeat that."

West Australian Premier Colin Barnett says there's no return of baiting for sharks, but says fisheries officers would continue to set drumlins for sharks that had attacked or posed danger.

"The reality was, though, that the drumlin policy was catching tiger sharks, a lot of them, but did not catch a great white," he says.

"That's why we stopped the program -- it was not proving effective in thinning out the great white population."

Yesterday's fatal shark attack was the 15th in Australia since 2000.

Newshub.