A California surfer was bitten on the leg by a 12-foot white shark early last month.
Eric Steinley, 38, was surfing North Salmon Creek Beach Oct. 3 off the Sonoma Coast. He has surfed the area since he was a kid and hits the local area at least four times a week.
“It was sunny, a lot of times at the coast up here it’s foggy and bad conditions, but it was sunny, and the water was clear,” Steinley told Tracking Sharks. He suited up in a black wetsuit, grabbed his white surfboard with a grey diamond pattern and hit the waves.
His girlfriend was working that day, so Eric planned to surf all day. He caught three waves and paddled 60 yards out to the 8- to 10-foot-deep water. The experienced waterman prefers to surf alone and was sitting far outside of a pack of 6 to 8 surfers.
Another surfer, Jared, paddled within 30 yards to surf the same area.
“I was sitting on my board, and I decided to take a paddle and go for a stroke to reposition myself. I took maybe one or two strokes and the next thing I know I was under water,” Eric said.
Initially he wasn’t sure what had happened. There was no thrashing, he just felt a strong pressure on his right leg and a deep cold as he was slowly being pulled horizontally underwater.
“I felt down to kind of feel what was on my leg . . . and the first thing I do is push like you would if you were trying to climb over a fence or something. So, I push with both my arms as hard as I could and nothing.”
When he felt something squishy , he realized it was a shark.
“I came across this thing’s eye socket, which is very creepy and indented . . . and as soon as I realized it was a shark I pushed harder. Once I couldn’t get away, I started to punch the thing in the eye area.”
He punched the shark twice, but on the second punch, his hand grazed the shark’s razor-sharp teeth and cut open his right hand. Thankfully, the shark let go and he was able to surface. Since he was under for so long, he was gasping for air.
Catching his breath, he pulled himself back on his board and started warning other surfers by yelling “shark!”
Although he did not know it at the time, the shark initially grabbed part of the surfboard with its bottom jaw, which most likely kept the shark from severing his leg. “I started to paddle and then as I was paddling, I looked back and I could see some pretty strong [blood] spray coming out of the back of my knee and so I was paddling, and I just kept thinking this shark’s going to come and take, you know take me out for sure.”
Jared was the closest surfer to him, and the two fought the waves to make it back to the beach.
Jared’s telling me, “Hey don’t look back! We’re gonna make it in. Don’t look at your leg.” With shock and increasing blood loss, the two men eventually caught a wave and made it back to the beach. “I started to see these spots, you know I don’t know if it was blood loss or not, but I started to see all these spots and I thought I don’t even know if I’m going to make it in now.”
When he made it to the beach other surfers ran to his aid. Several guys used their surf leashes to form makeshift tourniquets around Eric’s gushing leg wound. Luckily, an off-duty medic was there that day and ran to his car to grab his bag and a tourniquet to stem the bleeding.
Once the third tourniquet was in place, the Good Samaritans placed him on a long board and began carrying him up the beach and some very steep stairs. “They had to alternate because the stairs are so long, they had to alternate guys,” Eric explained.
After they reached the parking lot, emergency personnel were arriving, and a helicopter landed. “If it took me four minutes to paddle in, I’m going to say it only took another ten, ten to fifteen minutes until I was in the helicopter. Which was fantastic.”
The chopper flew him to Providence Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital where surgeons cleaned and sutured the wound.
Unfortunately, the white shark severed nerves and it is going to be a long road to Eric’s recovery. However, he is working hard and can even walk some now. A GoFundMe has been set up to help with his mounting medical bills and recovery.
When it comes to hitting the waves again, he has no hard feelings against the shark.
“They’re just out there doing their thing and we’re in their environment,” he said. Understandably, he has some hesitation.
“Initially I said no, I’m not gonna go back out, and umm, I’m kind of struggling with it,” he said, adding that he may start paddleboarding where he can stand up, but still surf some.
“It’s that weird feeling of having just a fantastic day and in a heartbeat in changed, and so I’m not sure how long it will take to kick that feeling. It would be different if I had a sensation or if I was doing something uncommonly stupid, but it wasn’t. It was like a perfect day for me.”
When he does go out again, he has a new circle of friends to help. Several of the guys who helped him that day have started a meal train and are keeping in touch with him as he heals.
If you or someone you know, has been involved in a shark attack bite, there is help.
