Three people are healing after receiving painful shark nibbles in Florida. Two bites occurred off New Smyrna Beach and a third occurred in St. Augustine.
The first occurred Aug. 20 when Carolina Jones was boogieboarding with friends and family around 11 a.m. off New Smyrna Beach.
She had just started to catch a wave near the 1100 block of North Atlantic Avenue when, “as soon as a I pushed off the ground to grab my wave . . . I felt a tear in my leg,” she told Fox 35 Orlando.
She warned her friends and family to head into shore and began making her way back to the beach. Jones was afraid to look at the wound near her knee. “I am a little queasy, so I didn’t look at it at all,” she said.
Once she made it back to the beach, authorities were alerted and paramedics transported her to the hospital.
“It wasn’t a terrible bite; it was pretty clean bite. It ended up being one bite on the leg,” she said. Initially, she thought she had been bitten twice as she kicked at the shark with her other leg. Doctors decided not to suture the wound but did provide antibiotics.
Jones is not upset with the shark and thinks it may have become confused as it was chasing mullet.
“I’ve been telling my friends it’s not like I was attacked, I was bitten . . . I just kind of got in his way,” she said. “I have a very good respect for sharks. They are very smart, [but] maybe [they do] not have the greatest eyesight.
Teen bitten in St. Augustine
On Aug. 22 Peyton McGinn, 14, was surfing off St. Augustine Beach around 11th Street. He had been in the water about 10 minutes when a 4- to 5-foot long shark grabbed his foot.
“I had just caught a wave with my surfboard and I was about to start paddling out, and the shark came up behind me and grabbed onto my foot and tore it up pretty bad,” he told News4JAX.
McGinn was able to wobble back to land and alert authorities. After being taken to the hospital, he received 25 stitches to his right ankle.
The teen, who is a freshman in high school, will be on crutches for about 10 days and hopes he will be healed so he can play football this fall.
6th shark bite reported at New Smyrna Beach
An unlucky man from Orlando became the sixth person to be bitten in 2020 by a shark in waters off New Smyrna Beach.
On Aug. 23, around 3 p.m., the unidentified 23-year old man was standing in chest-deep water when he was bitten on his foot by a shark. He was able to make it back to the beach and was treated on the scene, according to Volusia County Beach Safety. His injuries were not life-threatening.
New Smyrna Beach is the shark bite capital of the world. The area has a mix of surfers, baitfish and sharks which creates a collision course in the surf during summers. Thankfully, the majority of injuries have been considered minor.
All locations have been marked on the 2020 Shark Attack Map.
