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The threat of the grey nurse shark's extinction is scarier than sharing a dive with it, writes Genevieve Swart. I am 20 metres underwater, gazing at three grey nurse sharks and breathing heavily into my scuba gear. The three-metre sharks hang in a current, drifting with the immense grace and lazy power of a sleek predator. To the casual observer, it might not be clear who is most endangered in this situation. The answer is unequivocally the sharks. With fewer than 500 grey nurses surviving off the east coast, future generations of Australians may never see these critically endangered creatures anywhere other than an aquarium. I've come to South West Rocks, five hours' drive north of Sydney, to dive with the sharks - a trip inspired by the book Last Chance to See, by Douglas Adams and zoologist Mark Carwardinet