Answer to Map #100
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Answer: This week’s dot map depicted the locations of all known fatal crocodilian attacks to date of 2017 and 2018. By “crocodilian,” we mean any animal of the order crocodilia, which includes both alligators and crocodiles.
Crocodilians are native to every continent except Europe and Antarctica, though the species differ markedly from place to place. On this map, you can find dots indicating attacks by a wide variety of species. The mugger crocodile, for example, is responsible for nearly all of the attacks in the Ganges River of India. Throughout Southeast Asia and Oceania, the culprit is usually the saltwater crocodile. In the United States, watch out for the American alligator. On the coasts of Latin America, you can find the American crocodile. Inland in South America, you may encounter the Orinoco crocodile or a variety of species of caimans. And Africa is the homeland of the Nile crocodile.
We took the data for this map from a great website called “CrocBITE.” Initially founded by Charles Darwin University in Australia’s Northern Territory, CrocBITE maintains the Worldwide Crocodilian Attack Database, a comprehensive listing of all known crocodilian attacks on humans, both fatal and nonfatal. Of course, there are almost certainly crocodilian attacks that aren’t reported to authorities—CrocBITE estimates that the Nile crocodile in Africa is responsible for the largest number of attacks that go unreported. It’s an extraordinary site; please check it out if you get a chance.
What rapidly becomes clear if you map fatal crocodilian attacks is that there are quite a lot more of them in underdeveloped countries than there are in the developed world, especially Australia and the United States. The main reason for this trend is because people in the developed world are more insulated from the outdoors. By contrast, in underdeveloped countries, people have more need to live in dangerous conditions. The largest number of crocodilian attacks occur while people are fishing, followed by bathing and swimming. 461 known fatal crocodilian attacks on bathers since CrocBITE started keeping track could have been avoided if only everybody in the world had an indoor shower. 97 fatal attacks on people who were collecting water could also have been avoided with indoor plumbing.
The country with the most recorded all-time fatal attacks is Indonesia, followed by India, Malaysia, Madagascar, Zambia, and Papua New Guinea. The United States has a relatively large number of known attacks, but very few fatalities as compared with other countries. These statistics are likely skewed, however, by the fact that Americans are more likely to report non-fatal attacks to the authorities.
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