She's baaaack! (And maybe she's headed to Florida!)

After being silent since January, Katharine the Shark "pinged" Thursday off the coast of North Carolina, near Kitty Hawk.

When Katharine’s dorsal fin breaks the surface of the water, a signal is sent to a satellite, allowing her to be tracked in real time online. The last time Katharine surfaced was Jan. 5, pretty far east of Bermuda.

More:Great white shark extinction would upset balance of Atlantic Ocean

OCEARCH, a great white shark research and advocacy team, tagged Katharine in August 2013 off Cape Cod, Massachusetts. The great white shark was named by Cat Products fans in honor of Katharine Lee Bates, a Cape Cod native and songwriter, best known for her poem and song "America The Beautiful," which has been called "an expression of patriotism at its finest."

When tagged, Katharine weighed 2,300 pounds and was 14 feet 2 inches long.

Katharine made her presence known Thursday on Twitter to more than 55,000 followers. Researchers at OCEARCH were excited, too, and posted Katharine's "ping" to Facebook.

Katharine's trips to the Treasure Coast

Katharine spent the first several months of 2017 swimming around between Fort Pierce and Titusville.

After disappearing for a few months, Katharine popped up east of Vero Beach April 19, 2017. She wandered around on a generally northward path, pinging several times off Brevard County in May 2017.

More:Great white shark Hilton pings off the coast of Sebastian and Vero Beach

She also spent a lot of time near the Treasure Coast and throughout Florida in 2014.

According to her tracking device, Katharine’s Treasure Coast experience in 2014 took place over a brief 18-hour period.

She first pinged offshore of the Sebastian Inlet at 7:27 a.m. May 12. At 5:01 p.m., she swam in as close as The Monster Hole on the south side of the inlet, which is about a quarter-mile off the beach.

More:OCEARCH great white shark fishing adventure helped allay some fears 'Jaws' ingrained in me

The next morning, she headed into deeper water. By 6 p.m. May 13, she checked in at about 40 feet of water off the St. Lucie Inlet. Her next ping wasn’t for about 42 hours, and it was off the Boynton Beach Inlet.

More:Great white shark seen by anglers off Stuart

She then pinged in along the Florida Keys before entering the Gulf of Mexico. She spent June gaining more fans in the Gulf before swinging back south and heading toward Sarasota, where she pinged about 60 miles offshore at 7:11 a.m. July 6.

Katharine went silent for 11 days before she was pinged July 17 off Key Largo, but she didn’t stick around. By 11:28 a.m. July 21, she pinged about 30 miles off Ormond Beach, covering about 337 miles in four days.

Follow Katharine's travels at www.ocearch.org and on Twitter, @Shark_Katharine.

Great white sharks

Ocean’s most feared predator

Can grow to more than 21 feet long

Can weigh more than 2,500 pounds

Feed mainly on large sea mammals, such as seals, sea lions and dead whales

Have a bite force of 4,000 pounds

Live mostly in waters between 54 and 75 degrees

Are protected from harvest by Florida and federal laws

Maureen Kenyon is TCPalm's trends reporter, keeping Treasure Coast residents updated on hot topics and happenings. Do you have a story to tell? Want to start a conversation? Send an email to maureen.kenyon@tcpalm.com, call 772-221-4249 or follow her on Twitter @_MaureenKenyon_.