Wildlife Wonderland, an Australian wildlife park, closed down in 2012. When they left the park, they left one essential exhibit behind: Rosie the preserved, dead Great White Shark. This is Rosie’s tale, and this is where she is right now.

Rosie the Forgotten, Preserved Great White Shark
A great white shark was caught in tuna fishing nets off the coast of Australia in 1998. Unfortunately, no matter how hard the shark tried, they were unable to escape and became deeper entangled in the net. There was no safe method to release the shark, so those concerned had no alternative but to kill it as humanely as possible. Rosie was the shark’s name. Wildlife Wonderland took an interest in her and wanted to conserve and display her at their park, so she traveled there.

“Everyone was too scared to go in and fetch her out […] if you do that to a white shark, it’ll bite you and eat you.” So everyone is terrified to go in there, and the problem with these animals is that when they are stressed, their blood begins to boil, which kills them. Instead of letting her flail in the net, they utilized a single pole with a bullet in it. “Then they put a bullet through her brain, so it was instant death,” says her current owner, Tom Kapitany, a botanist, geologist, and entrepreneur.

Soon after, the park’s ambitious intentions to develop their marine species component proved to be too much for them to handle. Slowly but steadily, the park deteriorated due to a lack of funds to keep up with maintenance. The park closed in 2012, and all of the animals were relocated. Only one animal was left behind when they relocated the animals: Rosie, the preserved Great White Shark.

A Surprising Find
Rosie stayed in a tank of deadly formaldehyde there until 2018. When exploring the abandoned park for his YouTube channel, urban explorer Luke McPherson came upon Rosie’s tank. He documented the rotting wreckage of the abandoned wildlife park, with Rosie as the main attraction. That video has now received over 17 million views. While this video publicized Rosie’s existence, it also put her in danger.

“The difficulty was that everyone else wanted to do the same thing, they wanted to see Rosie the Shark, even though it was private property.” Individuals began breaking in at night and vandalizing all of the structures, exhibition halls and galleries, and antique amusement rides,” stated Kapitany. “They broke over the top of the tank, exposing the incredibly, highly toxic formaldehyde, to the point where you needed oxygen or breather masks to go in there.” Because it was that nasty, we had to wear full hazmat suits.”

The park owner became concerned about public liability. After all, if his defunct amusement park became a public health issue, he would be held responsible. He was about to destroy Rosie when Kapitany intervened and saved her.

A Brief History of Great White Sharks
This shark, known as the great white shark, is a huge mackerel shark that is also known as the white pointer. Great white sharks can be found in major oceans all around the world, and they prefer coastal surface waters near to shore. It is one of the world’s oldest species, with fossil records reaching back 200 million years in Portugal. Carcharodon carcharias is the scientific name for this species, which means “sharp teeth” in Latin. Scientists have been studying great white sharks for many years and have captured some of them alive. They investigated their behavior and food, which led them to believe that this species has been around for several million years.

The Rescue Operation
Kapitany got to work immediately after learning of her existence, transporting the shark and rehabilitating her. After all, she’d been sitting alone for six years. He took her to Crystal World in Melbourne, Australia. This is a crystal, fossil, and mineral research facility. By that point, the tank had become exceedingly poisonous, so Kapitany decided to replace it with the natural, safer preservative glycerin. This means that visitors will be able to see Rosie clearly without being exposed to hazardous formaldehyde fumes. According to Crystal World, over 50,000 people visit Rosie each year. When asked why he wanted to save Rosie, a long-dead great white shark, Kapitany answered it was a simple decision: education.

He explained that it is critical to preserve specimens like Rosie since white [sharks] are a protected endangered species. “Preserving and displaying her is about education and natural history preservation.” Making people aware of ocean life, including potentially harmful sharks, can have a global impact.”