Born in Italy and raised in the jungles of the Congo until she was 15, Cristina Zenato moved to the Bahamas in 1994 to learn to scuba dive. Over the past thirty years, this shark educator and behaviorist has not only made the archipelago her base of operations but has also developed a unique relationship with the sharks in the area, who have learned to recognize her and willingly approach her seeking help. So much so that she has developed a technique—now imitated around the world—for handling sharks underwater. It’s called Tonic Immobilization, and it came about by chance.
As she told the BBC, a few years ago a shark swam straight toward her face during a dive; she touched it to push it away, and, to her surprise, the animal stopped swimming and became completely motionless. Based on that discovery, she perfected a technique that involves gently stroking the Lorenzini ampullae—the electroreceptors that sharks have around their snouts—to induce a state of deep calm in the animal that can last several minutes.
From Immobilization to Hook Removal
The turning point in her work came later. One of the sharks that frequented the area where the Italian woman was diving approached her with a hook lodged in its mouth. Zenato opened the shark’s jaw and removed the hook with her hands; far from reacting aggressively, the animal later returned to let her pet it. Since then, other sharks have begun to approach her for the same reason, and Zenato has made the manual removal of hooks and fishing debris a routine part of her work, without ever sustaining an injury in the process.
In addition to her work with sharks, Zenato is a PADI Course Director and a full-fledged NSS-CDS cave instructor, and she has led exploration projects in underwater cave systems in the Bahamas, including the remapping of the caves in Lucayan National Park for the Bahamas National Trust. In fact, she was the first woman to connect an oceanic system from an inland freshwater cave.
She speaks Italian, English, German, French, and Spanish, which has allowed her to collaborate with scientists and behaviorists in countries such as South Africa, Fiji, China, and Mexico. She is a member of the Women Divers Hall of Fame and The Explorers Club, and her work has been featured by networks such as the BBC, Discovery, and National Geographic.
Educate to Protect
Zenato created the Caribbean Reef Shark Awareness Distinctive Specialty and founded the nonprofit organization People of the Water. Through both initiatives, he promotes diver education to dispel the misconception that sharks are naturally aggressive. During his guided dives, he invites participants to touch the shark’s skin while it remains motionless, based on the premise that we can only protect what we understand.
