An 8 ft shark was spotted yesterday at an Australia beach around 11am, forcing beaches to be closed for several hours.
The shark, which they have been unable to identify, was spotted at Cottesloe beach as close as 100 metres off shore.
The sighting comes after a group of great white and tiger sharks was seen last week feeding off a baby whale carcass near Rottnest Island.
Nineteen-year-old Elyse Frankcom had been hosting a swim-with-the-dolphins tour for Rockingham Wild Encounters when a shark bit into her hip and left buttock yesterday. The attack occurred off the north end of Garden Island Naval Base. Luckily for her, as the shark bit her, it brushed aside another man who grabbed hold of the shark’s tail, which caused it to let go.
Elyse then started to sink to the bottom but the man grabbed her and brought her to the surface and got her back on board the boat.
The attack comes only 10 weeks after Busselton surfer Nick Edwards was killed by a great white off Gracetown in WA’s South-West. And the attack happened in an area just 35km north of Port Kennedy, where father-of-three Brian Guest was mauled to death while snorkelling with his son in December 2008.
Ms Frankcom is recovering in Royal Perth Hospital.
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Michael Maguire of Morningside said he was kayaking along Norman Creek in Brisbane, AU at about 7.10am when he saw a “very big fish” in the water. It was bigger than his kayak and the fin came about 12 to 18 inches out of the water. Maguire paddled over to a jetty and hung on.
Being a teacher, Maguire said his first concern was the risk to children playing in the water and people dangling their feet in the creek from jetties.
Sharks have been seen diving out of the water for bats, fueling speculation that this behavior is a new way for them to find prey. Dog owners have been warned to keep animals away from the river banks at sunrise and sunset.
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Jake Davies, was surfing with his dad and a friend near Fraser’s Reef on Monday night when he was attacked by a shark as he paddled on a wave about 5pm. The shark grabbed his foot and pulled him down but Jake kicked back and it let go (phew). The shark tried two more times to nab Jake before the 15-year-old could ride a wave in and drag himself ashore.
“I was just paddling and something grabbed me and there was a big shadow behind me,” Jake said. “At first I thought I had jammed my foot in a rock, but then I thought rocks don’t close on either side of your foot. I got on my board and got out of there before it could come at me again,” he said. “I got out of there pretty quickly, but blood was all over the beach.”
He was rushed to the emergency room where he received a number of stitches and was treated for puncture wounds on his leg.
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A massive Tiger Shark feeding frenzy was spotted off the southern Queensland coast.
The rescue helicopter crew who filmed the sharks said they spotted more than a hundred of them encircling fishes in a long stretch of the coastal area in Noosa. The night crew were flying back from Fraser Island when they noticed the feeding sharks just 20 metres off the beach at Teewah.
Luckily, there were no swimmers in the vicinity but local life guards were alerted of their presence.
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A Sydney man stared was mauled by a shark while swimming in the Solomon Islands yesterday.
Benjamin D’Emden, 34, was holidaying on a remote island resort when the shark attacked him from below, biting him on his face! D’Emden was left with severe cuts to his face and neck. He was flown to the capital Honiara’s main hospital by an emergency medical charter.
Doctors at the National Referral Hospital were last night working to stabilise Mr D’Emden so he could be flown to Australia for emergency treatment.
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Nicholas Edwards, father-of-two, died after being attacked by a large shark in Western Australia’s world famous Margaret River surfing region.
Dunsborough police Sergeant Craig Anderson said 31-year-old Edwards was on his last day of vacation when he was attacked 300 metres from the South Point surf break south of Cowaramup Bay, near Gracetown.
Sergeant Anderson said a couple walking on the beach about 8am (WST) saw him sitting on his board waiting for a wave but when they turned around four minutes later, he had disappeared.
“They just saw the board only and a lot of grey objects around the board,” Sergeant Anderson said
“They’ve gone down a bit further and seen the fellow face down in the water amongst the rocks.”
It took the pair another six minutes to wade in and pull the unconscious surfer from the water. Sergeant Anderson said he was believed to already be dead but one of the rescuers tied a tourniquet and began CPR with the help of surfers who were suiting up in the carpark at the time.
“It appears that his right leg has been shredded with some significant injuries to the top of his leg and minor injuries to the calf,” Sergeant Anderson sa
About 10 minutes later his board washed up to shore after being bitten in half.
A surfer was knocked off his board and badly bitten by an unidentified shark on a remote beach on Western Australia’s south coast on Sunday.
The man was surfing at Conspicuous Beach, a rugged and isolated stretch of the Southern Ocean near the southwest town of Walpole, when he was attacked just after noon.
An ambulance rushed the man to Denmark Hospital and then transferred to a larger hospital in the southern city of Albany where he is expected to undergo surgery.
The surfer’s leg is believed to have been badly bitten during the attack.
Although the type of shark is yet to be identified, great whites are common in the area.
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A man was bitten by a shark while surfing at Point Plomer on Tuesday afternoon. Craig Gibson from Bribie Island had just finished riding a wave when the shark, believed to be a bull shark, struck about 4.30pm.
Gibson punched it in the head a few times but it didn’t let go. He had to wrestle with it to get away. Blood was pouring down Gibson’s leg from his calf to his ankle and he had jagged cuts. A paramedic at the camping ground administered first aid and Gibson was able to walk away with no major injuries.
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A shark sighting forced the cancellation of the annual Tamarama to Clovelly ocean swim halfway through the event.
Race director Joel Turner said about half of the 850 or so entrants were not able to swim out after a shark was spotted off Bronte Beach in Sydney’s east about 12.30pm.
About 100 swimmers were escorted to shore by race officials part way through the course. Nobody got eaten though.
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