Americas

Home page

Americas

Man is killed in shark attack in Florida

05 February 2010 02:45 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Ziya Agazade â€“ APA. Schafer, 38, was attacked Wednesday afternoon a quarter-mile off South Florida’s Atlantic Coast while he was out kiteboarding â€” using a large kite-like sail to pull him along the surface on a board strapped to his feet. When the winds lightened and his sail dropped, the Stuart man found himself in the water, surrounded by sharks, APA reports citing â€œAssociated Pressâ€.

Lifeguard Daniel Lund, 47, spotted Schafer as he scanned the ocean with binoculars from the beach about 100 miles north of Miami. He said Schafer appeared to be in distress but wasn’t flailing around. Instead, he seemed to be floating on his kite in the choppy water.

Afraid the blood would set off a feeding frenzy, Lund cradled the man’s head and with one arm, began paddling back to shore as fast as he could, fighting the current and wind.

About 20 minutes later, they were on the beach with paramedics performing CPR on a badly bleeding Schafer. He died a short time later at a hospital.

Lund, an artist and graphic designer with a lifelong love of the water, had a 10-inch gash in his right thigh and numerous teeth marks on his buttocks. Authorities said his right hand was mauled in an apparent attempt to fight off the animal â€” or animals.

Authorities are investigating what types of sharks were involved and whether more than one shark bit Schafer. Beaches remained open Thursday.

The International Shark Attack File at the University of Florida’s Museum of Natural History lists 1,032 documented shark attacks in the U.S. since 1690. Fifty of them were fatal.

The last fatal shark attack in the state was in 2005 off the Panhandle, where a 14-year-old Louisiana girl was attacked while swimming about 100 yards off shore.