Shark attack alerts for cellphones authorized by new federal law
President Trump has signed "Lulu's Law," which requires the FCC to allow emergency alert messages for shark attacks. It was inspired by shark attack survivor Lulu Gribbin.
Updated on: July 2, 2026 / 8:43 AM EDT / CBS/AP
Lulu Gribbin was 15 when she survived a shark attack off the coast of Florida. She lost her left hand, part of her right leg and almost her life.
What she didn't know when she entered the water on that day in 2024 was that another woman had been bitten by a shark 90 minutes earlier and just 3 miles down the beach. Had she known about the earlier attack, there is no way she would have been swimming, she said.
Gribbin's story has inspired new federal legislation to authorize emergency alerts to mobile phones to warn beachgoers when a shark has bitten someone in the area.
President Trump last week signed "Lulu's Law," which requires the Federal Communications Commission to allow the emergency messages. The legislation, which Gribbin advocated for , authorizes the warnings by classifying a shark attack as an event for which an emergency alert can be issued. It is up to states to implement the warnings. Gribbin's home state of Alabama approved such a warning system last year. It was sponsored by Republican State Rep. David Faulkner.
"It's really just common-sense legislation. It says that whenever there has been a shark attack in a certain area where you are near, it will send an alert to your phone, exactly like how an Amber Alert system works when a child is abducted," she said.