Jaws, Captured Shark

Killer shark found and killed
Local fishermen to recieve $3,000 reward for the capture
By Brian Ward


Amity- The shark belived to be involved in the deaths of Alex Kintner and Christine Watson has been captured and killed by local fishermen Mike Swenson.


The shark was captured in the waters one mile south-southwest of Amity before being brought back for inspection by officals.


The 11-foot -long, 875 pound nurse shark was inspected by Matt Hooper, a marine biologist from Woods Hole, M.A. According to Hooper, there has never been any reported incident of a nurse shark attacking a person.

In reponse to the shark's capture, the beaches at Amity will be re-opened immediately, in time for the Fourth of July weekend.

Despite the shark's killing, shark spotters from the Coast guard, the Marine Patrol, the Massachusetts State Police, the U.S. Navy, Homeland Security, the FBI, and other police agencies will remain to check the waters off the beach.

The weekend tourist arrived on schedule, and beaches filled up quickly. as the day went on people started feeling safe enough to go into the water.
There was a brief panic, when two young boys from Amity, Wayne Winston and Brad Chaplin,  swam underneath swimmers with snorkels and a fake shark fin.  

When the boys came out of the water, face to face with a offical with a gun, Wayne pointed to Brad and shouted "He made me do it."


 No-one was injured trying to get out of the water, and the boys have been remained to the custody of their parents.
 


 

JAWS dayt wo

Town holds meeting after shark kills two people

Local fisherman offers to hunt down shark for $10,000

by Brian Ward

Amity-  A day after a shark killed both 10-year-old Alex Kintner  and Amity  High School senior Christine Watson, Amity officals held a meeting on what to do in response.

The meeting was filled by concerned Amity business owners, worried what effects the recent shark attack would have on their businesses.  

Chief of Police Martin Brody was the first to speak, saying in response to the shark attacks, the beaches at Amity would be closed, and deputies and shark experts would be called in to help handle the situation. 

This caused an uproar amongst the crowd, many of who's businesses depend on the beach tourism, particularly during the Fourth of July weekend.

Mayor Larry Vaughan was quick to interject, saying  that the beaches would only be closed for 24 hours.

"24 hours is like three weeks!' yell one member of the crowd.

The uproar was silenced by the scratching of nails against a blackboard, when local fisherman Ben Quinn decided it was time for him to speak.

"Ya'll know me, how i earn a living. i'll catch this bird for ya," he said

Quinn went on to explain that hunting the shark down wouldn't be an easy task, and that he would need more than the $3,000 reward offered by Mrs. Kintner.

"I'll find it for $3 [000], kill it for $10[000],"  he said. 

Feature: Bramlett

Feature: Stephanie Bramlett

The CONNECT program’s newest Program Director

By Brian Ward

Durham- Stephanie Bramlett is a lively and talkative 27-year-old, with a master’s in political science and a Ph.D. in sociology.

She is also the new Program Director for CONNECT, an undergraduate multicultural program for students of different races and ethnicities at UNH.   

Bramlett was born in San Diego, C.A. in 1984, and did her undergraduate program at a small liberal arts college in Massachusetts, studying political science.

“Senior year of college, I was sitting with some friends the night before graduation and everybody’s parents are about to come up, and hanging out with friends and we were looking at this big box of old pictures, and we kept flipping through the pictures and find that ‘wait a second this person isn’t here anymore, this person isn’t here anymore, this person isn’t here anymore,’” she said.

 After graduating in 2006, Bramlett came to UNH for her graduate work in sociology, studying college retention for five years before receiving her Ph.D.

She wanted to do something about the large number of students of color who didn’t graduate from college and when the position of CONNECT Program Manager opened up, she took the position.

CONNECT was founded in 1994, and offers a week long orientation to students of color entering as freshmen and transfer students to UNH before fall classes and provides academic assistance and social support throughout the year.

“I’ve always thought CONNECT was a really interesting program, it is one of our strongest retention programs, it’s a great program, we know that students who go through CONNECT graduate at a higher rate,” she said.

Bramlett became program director this August, just two weeks before the first group of CONNECT freshmen were scheduled to arrive.

“I get here Aug. 8^th, and I don’t have access to log on to the computer yet, and I know that I’m going to have a 100 students and 20 mentors coming in two weeks, and I basically have two weeks to learn everything about the CONNECT program,” she said

“I have this nice schedule printed out, and it has a whole bunch of people’s names on it, and they’re going to come and talk at these assigned times, but I have no idea what they’re coming to talk about.”

By using her connections at OMSA, the Office of Multicultural Affairs and C-FAR, the Center for Academic Resources, Bramlett called everyone on the schedule to ask what they were going to speak about. By the time the students arrived, she was ready.

“I think she’s done a good job, it usually takes two years to get a handle of a job,” OMSA Multicultural Coordinator, Otis Douce, said.

Most of the students that go through OMSA were part of the CONNECT program, tying the two organizations closely together. OMSA takes a large part in CONNECT’s summer program, and Douce expects Bramlett to continue doing a good job as director.

With her background in research, Bramlett plans to make CONNECT more oriented toward academics. According to her, the best way to retain students is to get them involved early academically.

“Academics was always a backbone of CONNECT, but students will start getting that academic 

focus immediately,” she said. 

Her new plans will consist of students applying to the CONNECT summer program with a specific major or profession in mind, and then splitting off into groups to work on scholarships and learn about the professions they’re interested in.  She said that CONNECT students could still look forward to evening activities and games, and get a jump start on their academic careers.

“CONNECT is changing a lot next year,” she said

Work cited

Bramlett, Stephanie. "Bramlett Feature." Personal interview. 2 Dec. 2011.

Douce, Otis. "Bramlett Feature." Personal interview. 5 Dec. 2011.

"CONNECT Program." Home | University of New Hampshire. 2010. Web. 05 Dec. 2011. <http://www.unh.edu/connect/>.

"UNH Office of Multicultural Student Affairs OMSA." Home | University of New Hampshire. 2011. Web. 05 Dec. 2011. <http://www.unh.edu/omsa/>.

Sidebar

The true chances of being attacked by a shark in New Hampshire waters

Recent shark attack in Massachusetts worries state residents

By Brian Ward

N.H. - After a recent string of apparent shark attacks in Amity, M.A. that have left two people dead, many New Hampshire swimmers are questioning if its safe to go in the water.

According to Doug Grout, the Chief of Marine Fisheries at N.H. Fish and Game  during a phone interview, the answer is yes.

“Haven’t had any shark attacks up here, sharks don’t really occur where people swim,” he said.

Grout went on to say that he has lived in N.H. since 1970 and has never heard of a single shark attack reported in state waters in that time, and doesn't ever expect any to occur.

The most common type of shark living off the coast of New Hampshire is the spiny dogfish, which typically doesn’t grow any more than 3.5 feet long. Larger sharks such as the short-fin mako, porbeagle and blue shark live out in deeper waters and are rare to this area.

“Things are pretty harmless around here, that’s the good thing about NH you don’t have to worry about things biting or sticking you,” he said.

Shark attacks are extremely rare, with an average of 65 attacks reported worldwide in a given year, very few of which are fatal.

In a given year, a person is more likely to be killed by a dog, a snake, a car crash, a lightning strike, by drowning or by digging a hole in the sand than they are by a shark. Nearly 200,000 people in the U.S. were injured by chainsaws, ladders and toilets in a single year, while only 13 were injured by a shark bite.

In a famous study done between 1977 and 1995, more people were killed in the U.S. by toppling vending machines on themselves than by a shark attack.  

Work cited

Grout, Doug. "N.H. Shark Attacks." Telephone interview. 5 Dec. 2011.

Reilly, Michael. "Shark Attacks: What Are the Odds? : Discovery News." Discovery News: Earth, Space, Tech, Animals, History, Adventure, Human, Autos. 2 Aug. 2010. Web. 05 Dec. 2011. <http://news.discovery.com/earth/shark-attacks-what-are-the-odds.html>.

Jaws Color piece

Child is killed in apparent shark attack

Pandemonium at Village Beach as boy is killed in front of beach-goers 

By Brian Ward

Amity- At 2 p.m. this afternoon, 10-year-old Alex B. Kintner was killed while swimming in the waters off Village Beach when he was killed. First reports show that Alex was attacked by a shark as he was playing on his inflatable raft.

The relaxed air of the beach turned to horror, as Alex was ripped down into spray of red water, mere feet away from the other children swimming next to him. Parents and beach-goers charged into the ocean to pull out screaming and crying children from the waters.

Alex’s mother, Marion Kintner, has been sent to the hospital for shock, and is currently in fair condition.

Authorities are now looking into the possibility that the death of Christine W. Watson, who had died the night before and whose body had been found horribly mauled this morning, is also linked to shark activity in the area.

A special meeting will be held today by the Mayor Larry Vaughan, chief of police Martin Brody, and the Amity 

Board of Selectmen to discuss the possibility of closing the beaches on the 4^th of July, and possible compensation to the Kintner family.

Jaws Shock Piece

Amity High School senior found dead at South Beach this morning

Victim was badly mauled, and authorities are not yet sure at the cause of death

By Brian Ward

Amity- Christine W. Watson was found dead at South Beach this morning after disappearing from a beach party on Sun. night. Watson’s body had been mauled by an unknown attacker of unknown origin.

Watson had been attending a beach party on Sun. night before leaving with Christopher Hoggenbottam III, a sophomore at Trinity College, to go swimming. Watson, varsity swim team member and lifeguard at the Amity Island YMCA, entered the water at a remote section of South Beach near the South Beach Shoal bell buoy and didn’t come out.  Both teenagers had been drinking heavily at the party, and there were some reports of possible marijuana abuse.

Hoggenbottam notified the police about Watson’s disappearance at around 6 a.m. this morning, and a brief search found her body mangled on the beach.

The possibility of a shark attack hasn’t been ruled out, but according to Medical Examiner Robert Nevin, there is no evidence that the wounds were caused by a shark. “The wounds are consistent with a motorboat propeller,” Nevin said.

The weather was calm and clear on the night of Watson’s disappearance, and according to Mayor Larry Vaughan there is a good chance that Watson was hit by a fisherman out taking advantage of the good conditions. When asked how the death would effect Fourth of July events, Vaughan said ”it’s so far away from where people are swimming, no precautions will be taken.”

Job Cover Letter

Mr. Oliver,

My name is Brian Ward, and I want to become the new blogger for the Cruise with Bruce radio program.  I enjoy challenges and engaging with people and with this job I will expanded the number of followers for your radio series while pursuing my interests in writing and foreign affairs.

 I am a sophomore and Journalism major at the University of New Hampshire. My first year at the University of New Hampshire, I was accepted into the university’s Honors Program after my first semester; ending my freshman year with 3.83 overall GPA and a 4.0 for my second semester.

I started writing when I was thirteen, starting with poetry and moving into journalism and creative nonfiction in college.  I have received high grades in all my college English classes, and have gotten a lot of positive feedback regarding my research and creative nonfiction pieces. I have continuously received praise for my work in poetry, with some of my pieces read as part of Memorial Day events at my and neighboring towns.

I was a Boy Scout for eight years, working as a Patrol Leader and Senior Patrol Leader, spent five years earning my black belt in Tae Kwon Do, and am currently fencing saber on the UNH Fencing Team. These experiences have taught me how to talk and interact with other people, follow my responsibilities with discipline and diligence, and take the lead in situations where it might be easier to step back.

This job is a great opportunity for me to learn and get into the broadcasting and journalism fields and work toward becoming a travel writer. If hired I will work diligently to make sure as many people as possible will be following your radio program when it airs, and even more than that will be listening by the time the program finishes.

Thank you for your time and consideration

Brian Ward

Email: britimward@gmail.com

Phone: (603)-418-5435