An avid waterman is healing after being attacked by what he estimates was a 14- to 15-foot great white shark off Banyans in Hawaii.
Recovering from home, Jahred Willeford, 38, recalled how just a week before he was attacked, he had a run-in with the same shark.
“. . . it was probably only two to three miles from Banyans where I got attacked,” Willeford told Tracking Sharks.
Willeford, who fishes the area regularly and had caught a 350-pound marlin from his kayak the day before, was about 2 miles offshore when a white shark surfaced 10 to 15 feet in front of him.
“I saw it and then watched it kind of, you know, fade off,” he said. The event lasted less than two minutes until Willeford said he “paddled my ass off away from it.”
White sharks are known to visit Hawaii and could be drawn to the area by humpback whales that breed in the area from November to April. The same week as Willeford was attacked one was captured on film off the Big Island’s Kaehole Point by underwater photographer Deron Verbeck.
The encounter was not the first time Willeford has been visited by sharks. He often sees large tigers and a variety of other species as he fishes offshore. The lifelong fisherman noted that he has seen the fish population steadily declining, which he suggested could be related trawling fishing operations in which fishing vessels drop nets and catch entire schools of fish.
Even though he witnessed a white shark firsthand, it didn’t keep him from heading out to the Banyans surf spot on the Kona side of the Big Island Dec. 4.
Willeford, who had not been fishing that day, was sharing the water and inconsistent 2- to 3-foot waves with two other surfers. Around 6 p.m. he was sitting on his board watching fireworks going off at cove down the beach. Unfortunately, he didn’t know at the time, but it was a celebration of life ceremony for one of his friends who had passed away.
“After I looked down from looking up at the fireworks there. It [a shark] was just there coming. It was about 8 to 10 feet away, mouth wide open, just coming in slow motion. It was just super slow, but also really fast,” he said.
He was sitting on top of his board but felt as if he was being pulled under by displacement of the water from the large shark as it approached.
“I was just like is this really happening? And then Wham!”
The shark’s nose impacted straight into the waterman’s jaw knocking out one tooth and loosening several others.
“And I’m almost positive that’s what saved me. The impact just stunned the shark enough to keep its mouth open to where I could get away.”
The shark’s teeth tore into his arm as he used it to roll underneath the shark at its jaws and then pushed off the shark’s belly using his knee. The shark’s rough denticles sanded off the skin of Willeford’s knee as he pushed off it.
“I got under it, and it went over the top of me, and I waited. I remember watching it pass over, and once it was clear, I just pushed off the reef.
“I was thinking it was 18-feet, but it was a 14- to 15-foot-long shark and I’m almost positive it was pregnant, just the way it was shaped and everything.”
In footage of the shark attack, you can see Willeford pop out of the water with tremendous force. This is because he pushed so hard off the bottom of the reef to get out of the water.
Thankfully, once he breached the surface another surfer was there. The unidentified female noticed Willford disappear and bravely waited for him to come back up.
Willeford, who doesn’t wear a surf leash hopped on the front of the woman’s board and as the two began rapidly paddling back to shore the girl looked at the shark which she described as a “submarine.”
“That shark was still out there, but I know they bite, and they take a break most times, you’ll have a little time before they come back. So, I wasn’t trying to stress about it coming back too much, I was mainly focused on trying to stop my bleeding because it was horrific and I could feel the blood pumping out,” he said.
He asked the lifesaver to use her leash as a tourniquet and she began wrapping the cord around his arm. After a second try, she was able to slow the bleeding until they could make it back to safety.
Once they were on the beach Good Samaritans carried the injured surfer toward the road where a police officer applied a proper tourniquet.
Willeford was taken to the hospital where he received 70 stitches to reattach his ulna nerve and repair the damaged muscle and tissues.
Despite the injury and the physical therapy involved, he will be hitting the water as soon as he is able.
“A lot of people wanted to go and try to kill that shark or whatever. And I’m like, why would you ever want to do that? It’s not at fault.”
While he doesn’t hold any ill will toward the shark, he does have some recommendations for those who venture into the sea.
“Don’t ever let your guard down in ocean. Because there’s no fences and no gates and anything can happen. There’s a lot of sharks and they’re getting hungrier as they have less food,” he said before jokingly adding, “so we’re their next option.”
A GoFundMe has been setup to help Willeford with his medical bills.
Jahred is also working on a graphic novella to help educate others on the incident.
The approximate location is posted on the 2021 Shark Attack map.
