Cristina Zenato is an

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance languag ...

-born shark diver and conservationist. She is known for her work with

Caribbean reef shark The Caribbean reef shark (''Carcharhinus perezi'') is a species of requiem shark, belonging to the family Carcharhinidae. It is found in the tropical waters of the western Atlantic Ocean from Florida to Brazil, and is the most commonly encounte ...

s in

The Bahamas The Bahamas, officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic and island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the Atlantic Ocean. It contains 97 per cent of the archipelago's land area and 88 per cent of ...

Early life

Zenato was born in Italy in 1971. Her father was a special forces military diver. She was raised in the Congo until she was 15. She completed high school in Italy.

Career

Zenato began scuba diving at age 22 when traveling to The Bahamas. She started training as a dive instructor and working with sharks in 1995. The same year, she began working for Underwater Explorer's Society (UNEXSO). Later, she became both a PADI Course Director and NSS-CDS

Cave Diving Cave-diving is underwater diving in water-filled caves. It may be done as an extreme sport, a way of exploring flooded caves for scientific investigation, or for the underwater search and recovery, search for and recovery of divers or, as in th ...

Instructor. Zenato's cave diving projects have included remapping the underwater caves in the Lucayan National Park. Zenato was inducted into the

Women Divers Hall of Fame The Women Divers Hall of Fame (WDHOF) is an international honor society. Its purpose is to honor the accomplishments of women divers, and their contributions to various fields of underwater diving Underwater diving, as a human activity, ...

in 2011. She is known for promoting the conservation of, diving with, removing fish hooks from Caribbean reef sharks around

Grand Bahama Island Grand Bahama is the northernmost of the islands of the Bahamas. It is the third largest island in the Bahamas island chain of approximately 700 islands and 2,400 cays. The island is roughly in area and approximately long west to east and at it ...

. Her work has garnered her the titles of "shark whisperer" and "mother of sharks." Zenato has been featured in films and television programs including

Shark Week Shark Week is an annual week-long programming block on the Discovery Channel focusing on shark-themed programming. It originally premiered on July 17, 1988. The block is featured annually in the summer, and was originally devoted to conservati ...

's ''Sharktacular'', ''Against the Current'', and ''Save This Shark.'' In the late 2010s, she founded the non-profit, People of the Water. She completed her PADI Course Director training in 2016.

Personal life

Zenato first went to the Bahamas in 1994, during which time she decided she wanted to move there permanently.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zenato, Cristina 1971 births Living people Cave diving explorers Professional divers Italian underwater divers Shark conservation Women Divers Hall of Fame