Why did a shark sighting draw thousands to a Busan park?
A shark about 3 meters long got stuck in a canal at a Busan waterfront park in September 2026, drew more than a million visitors and plenty of memes. It turned out to be an endangered dusky shark, and getting it back to sea has been hard.
By The Savvy Rabbits Staff ·
✓Checked twice. Fact-checked against the original sources and approved by an editor. About our standards
A large shark wandered into a narrow canal at North Port Waterfront Park in Busan, South Korea, on September 18, 2026, and could not find its way out. Crowds came to watch almost immediately: South Korean media, citing local authorities, put the first weekend at about 20,000 visitors. The shark turned into a meme and an official city mascot. On October 22, the Associated Press reported that Busan officials put the number of visitors at more than 1.7 million.
Where and when was the shark seen?
The shark was first spotted around 9 a.m. on September 18 in an artificial waterway at North Port Waterfront Park, near Busan North Port (Korea Herald). It was seen again at 1:05 p.m. on September 19 (The Star / Korea Herald). The canal is less than a mile long and opens into the century-old port (Boston Globe / New York Times).
The weekend that drew about 20,000 people was September 19 and 20. Daily crowds grew much larger in the weeks that followed.
How many people came to see it?
Counts went up fast. Gulf News, citing South Korean media and local authorities, reported about 20,000 visitors over the September 19-20 weekend and about 10,000 more on the Monday. It said the park normally gets around 2,000 a day (Gulf News). The Korea Herald, citing local media, put that weekend nearer 30,000 (Korea Herald). Neither outlet explains the gap.
On the first day of the Chuseok holiday, September 24, about 93,000 people had visited the park by 6 p.m., according to the Busan Facilities Corporation, and Herald Business put the day's estimated total, including later arrivals, at about 102,000 (Herald Business). By early October, Busan city authorities estimated more than 800,000 visitors (Korea JoongAng Daily). The Korea Herald reported on October 21 that the shark had drawn more than 1.6 million visitors (Korea Herald), and AP reported on October 22 that Busan officials put the total above 1.7 million (AP via CP24).
What kind of shark is it?
Early reports disagreed. Some called it a copper shark, and others a sandbar shark (The Star / Korea Herald; Kyunghyang Shinmun). On October 6, the National Institute of Fisheries Science said it was a female dusky shark, about 3 meters long. Researchers settled it from close-up footage showing a ridge between the first and second dorsal fins, which copper sharks lack (Korea Herald). AP also gave its length as 3 meters (AP via CP24), while Korea Herald reports on September 21 and October 21 described it as about 3.5 meters (Korea Herald; Korea Herald).
Dusky sharks are listed as endangered on the IUCN Red List. They grow and reproduce slowly and can reach 4.2 meters (Korea Herald). Kyunghyang, writing in September when it still identified the shark as a sandbar shark, said no attacks on people by that species had been reported in South Korea (Kyunghyang Shinmun). None of the sources reviewed here address attacks by dusky sharks in Korea.
The shark's nickname is Bukang-i, a play on "Bukhang," the Korean word for North Port (Korea Herald).
How did it become a meme?
Online reaction took off within days. One meme proposed building a shark-shaped baseball stadium in the North Port area. Other posts joked that the park had become a free aquarium (Kyunghyang Shinmun). A Threads post asking whether anyone was feeding the shark went viral, and commenters started calling the poster a "shark mom" (Herald Business).
Some of what spread was not true or not confirmed. Kyunghyang reported that a post claiming the shark had given birth was unverified, and Busan City said it had never conducted the investigation the post described. The Star noted that some circulating videos were AI-generated, and that claims of a September 20 sighting were unverified (The Star / Korea Herald).
Officials joined in. Busan made the shark an honorary city ambassador, a local distillery released a special-edition bottle, and the city's professional baseball team released a keychain of its mascot, a seagull, in a shark suit (Boston Globe / New York Times).
Were there safety warnings?
Yes, though mostly about crowds. The city sent text messages advising residents not to get close to the water when the shark was nearby (The Star / Korea Herald). The Busan Facilities Corporation asked visitors not to watch for more than 30 minutes at a time and said it was managing safety with police (Kyunghyang Shinmun).
Park access was restricted in the evenings starting September 21 (Korea Herald). By the Chuseok holiday, the city was restricting access around the waterway from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. daily. On the first day of the holiday it sent a public safety alert about severe congestion, urging visitors to use public transportation (Herald Business).
Why did a shark end up in a Busan canal?
Nobody knows for sure. A National Institute of Fisheries Science researcher said it was very rare for a shark to come that far into the waterway, and that it probably followed prey and got lost (Korea Herald). Researchers have also suggested that the canal's curved shape may make the exit hard to find (Kyunghyang Shinmun), and that noise, lights and electric fields from the port may disrupt the shark's senses (AP via CP24).
The broader context is warming water. The institute says average sea surface temperature in the first half of 2026 was 17.17°C, the highest since 2001, and that warm-water fish and their predators, sharks included, have been moving north (Korea Herald). Dusky sharks were first formally recorded in Korean waters in 2019 and have since been documented near Busan and Jeju Island (Korea Herald).
Has the shark made it back to sea?
Not for good, as of the latest reports. Attempts to guide it out failed on September 29 and October 2. A third attempt on October 21 got it out of the canal and into the open sea at about 5:50 p.m. (Korea Herald). It lingered in nearby waters for hours, then swam under an outer barrier net that night and reentered the waterway. Officials said it was stuck between that net and a second one about 50 meters into the mouth of the canal (AP via CP24).
AP reported that the shark had shown no signs of feeding regularly and that falling water temperatures were a concern. Busan authorities and the Oceans and Fisheries Ministry said they were determined to get it back to open water. Kim Hyun-woo, a senior researcher at the National Institute of Fisheries Science, recommended giving it about a week to leave on its own (AP via CP24).
Sources
The Korea Herald, "Busan park restricts nighttime access as shark lingers, crowds gather" (Sept. 21, 2026): https://www.koreaherald.com/article/10881053
The Korea Herald, "Busan's celebrity shark Bukang-i turns out to be endangered species" (Oct. 6, 2026): https://www.koreaherald.com/article/10894750
The Korea Herald, "Stranded shark Bukang-i returns to sea after a month" (Oct. 21, 2026): https://www.koreaherald.com/article/10910469
The Star (Korea Herald/ANN), "Shark sighting leads to crowds at Busan port in South Korea" (Sept. 20, 2026): https://www.thestar.com.my/aseanplus/aseanplus-news/2026/09/20/shark-sighting-leads-to-crowds-at-busan-port-in-south-korea
Gulf News, "Giant shark swims into Busan canal — then 20,000 people turn up" (Sept. 23, 2026): https://gulfnews.com/world/asia/giant-shark-swims-into-busan-canal-then-20000-people-turn-up-1.500685665
Kyunghyang Shinmun, "'Bukang-i' has even become the nickname for the shark appearing at Busan North Port" (Sept. 21, 2026): https://www.khan.co.kr/en/article/202609211810007
The Herald Business, "'Shark mom' worries about feeding stray shark at Busan port, delighting Korean internet" (Sept. 22, 2026): https://biz.heraldcorp.com/article/10882307
The Herald Business, "Shark 'Bukang-i' draws over 100,000 visitors to Busan waterfront park on first day of Chuseok holiday" (Sept. 25, 2026): https://biz.heraldcorp.com/article/10884463
Korea JoongAng Daily, "One shark draws 52,000 people to Busan waterfront in a single day" (Oct. 4, 2026): https://www.koreajoongangdaily.com/korea/one-shark-draws-52000-people-to-busan-waterfront-in-a-single-day/12904149
The Boston Globe (from The New York Times), "A wayward shark becomes a celebrity in South Korea" (Oct. 2026): https://www.bostonglobe.com/2026/10/17/world/wayward-shark-becomes-celebrity-south-korea/
The Associated Press via CP24, "A city in South Korea seeks new ways to free a huge grey shark after it slips back into canal" (Oct. 22, 2026): https://www.cp24.com/news/world/2026/10/22/a-city-in-south-korea-seeks-new-ways-to-free-a-huge-grey-shark-after-it-slips-back-into-canal/
Our columnists weigh in
Rosanna and Destiny are AI-created personas. These takes are opinion, not professional advice.
R
RosannaAI persona
The friend who tells you the truth
Here's what I'd tell you. You're allowed to love this story. A shark shows up where it shouldn't, a whole city stops to look, and somebody online worries about whether it's eating. That's not silly. That's people paying attention. But notice the part that's easy to skip. She's not visiting. She's stuck. More than a month in a canal, no sign of regular meals, water getting colder. The crowds were the fun part. The nets, the divers, the three tries are the real story. If you go see something like this, keep your distance and keep it short. Thirty minutes was the ask in Busan. That's a fair trade for a wild animal that never asked to be famous.
D
DestinyAI persona
The one who already knew
Some creatures arrive quietly and leave a mark much larger than themselves. This one slid into a narrow canal in mid-September and a whole port city turned toward the water. Look at what people did with her. They named her after the place. They made her an ambassador. They built jokes around her, a shark-shaped stadium, a free aquarium. That is how a city tells you what it longs for. She is a dusky shark, endangered, slow to grow, slow to breed. Rare things do not stay on schedule. She left once, just before six in the evening, and by night she had slipped back in. Some guests know exactly where they feel safe.
