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Florida Woman Attacked, Bitten Twice By Shark Off Cape Canaveral

By Dustin Wicksell
Published on: 08:54 PST, Oct 8, 2014

A Florida woman was hospitalized on Tuesday, after an attack in the waters off Cape Canaveral where she was bitten by a shark not once, but twice.

The victim was attacked along the shoreline off Washington Avenue near Cherie Down Park, according to WFTV. The unnamed woman, who was reportedly standing around 25 yards from the shore, was fishing when the shark struck her. The woman was bitten twice on her right thigh by the shark, leaving puncture wounds that were clearly visible to witnesses. Following the attack, observers reported that the woman walked to shore under her own power, as blood poured from the wounds to her leg.

“There was just two bites on the upper thigh, about 3-4 inches apart,” witness Dick MacDonald observed. “Obviously shark bites. You could tell. (She was) bleeding pretty badly.”

Another witness to the attack used the shirt off his back to apply pressure to the wounds, before calling 911. Beachgoers observed that the woman was quiet following the attack, leading them to fear that she was suffering from shock. According to WKMG Local, the victim was transported to Cape Canaveral Hospital by ambulance.

Shark attacks are nothing new on Florida’s East coast. New Smyrna Beach, located North of Cape Canaveral, is regularly referred to as the “shark attack capital of the world,” due to the frequency with which incidents occur. Just this past weekend, two surfers were struck by sharks in the area near New Smyrna Beach in separate incidents that occurred just a mile apart. As The Inquisitr previously noted, a 15-year-old surfer was bitten just 100 yards from shore, a half an hour before 29-year-old Kevin Ross was similarly injured by a shark.

Authorities believe it unlikely that the same shark was responsible for the dual attacks in New Smyrna Beach this weekend. The 15-year-old victim was unable to identify the species of shark that struck him, although the bite radius proved it was a relatively small specimen, measuring between three and five feet in length. Ross was able to identify the animal that attacked him as a blacktip shark, a species commonly found along the Florida coast.

There was no immediate update on the woman’s condition, and it was unclear what species of shark was responsible for the attack.

[Image: Jeffrey Langlois via The Daily Mail]

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