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Shark attacks couple in N. Carolina, killing man
©Associated Press
© St. Petersburg Times,
The death came just two days after the first fatal shark attack this year in the United States. A 10-year-old boy was killed Saturday at Virginia Beach, Va. Dare County Emergency Management officials confirmed the man and woman were attacked around 6 p.m. in Avon, 135 miles down the coast from Virginia Beach. "It was a beautiful day and there were several people in the water with them," said dispatcher N.H. Sanderson. Jack Musick, a researcher at the Virginia Institute of Marine Sciences, called the back-to-back attacks in the same coastal zone extraordinary. "It's unprecedented," said Musick, who has headed the Gloucester, Va., institute's shark research program since 1973. "I think it's a matter of chance," he said Monday night. "But that's not very far south of Virginia Beach. It's straight down the beach in the same general ecological area, so that's really unusual for that to happen." Dr. Seaborn Blair at Avon Medical Center said the man was dead and the woman was in critical condition. The woman had been flown to the Sentara Norfolk General Hospital in Virginia with substantial wounds to her lower torso. Blair said he thought the couple were from northern Virginia. Sentara Norfolk spokeswoman Vicky Gray said the woman underwent surgery and was in critical but stable condition. "Our physicians indicate that they are very optimistic," Gray said. The victims' names were not released. They were thought to be in their 20s. The Virginia attack occurred Saturday in 4 feet of water about 50 yards from the shore off Sandbridge Beach, said Ed Brazle, division chief for the city's Emergency Medical Services. The shark ripped a 17-inch gash in 10-year-old David Peltier's left leg and did not release him until after the boy's father hit the shark on the head. The father carried David ashore but he died hours later after losing large amounts of blood from a severed artery. A police helicopter carrying marine scientists periodically flew over Virginia Beach on Monday, and several police boats were on the water. A shark was spotted 200 yards off a military beach that is closed to the public, but marine scientists did not think it was the shark that attacked David. Tourists and residents were talking about the shark attack Monday, but weren't put off enough to cancel hotel reservations or stay away from the beach. "This attack in Virginia is an extremely rare event," said George H. Burgess, coordinator of museum operations for the Florida Museum of Natural History, which maintains the International Shark Attack File. "There have only been five attacks in the state historically. . . . It's highly unusual." Marine biologists with the Virginia Marine Science Museum examined a photograph of David's wounds and concluded that the shark belonged to the family that includes blacktip and sandbar sharks. Both types are common off the coast of Virginia in the summer, but neither is known for attacks on humans. "You can't tell which shark in that family it is," said biologist Maylon White, who spent the day in a police helicopter surveilling the Virginia Beach shoreline in search of sharks. In Florida, a sailor at the Mayport Naval Station near Jacksonville was bitten on the foot by a shark Sunday, Navy officials said Monday. The bite was apparently not serious, and the man was treated at a hospital and released. His name was not released. Fifty-two shark attacks have occurred worldwide this year, including three fatal ones, Burgess said. Twenty-nine have been in Florida waters. Last year, there were 84 shark attacks worldwide, 53 in the United States, he said. -- Information from the Washington Post was used in this report.
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From the Times wire desk
From the AP |
