Huge shark bites canoe in half, man flags down boat in ‘plagued’ waters

A retired accountant narrowly avoided tragedy when his canoe was targeted by a 3m shark during a training paddle.

A retired accountant narrowly avoided death after a massive shark took a chunk out of his canoe during an early morning training paddle.

The man was near the Coffs Harbour South Break Wall, on the NSW north coast, last Wednesday, when a 3m shark lunged at his outrigger canoe.

A jaw-dropping photo later shared by Dorsal Shark Reports Australia to Facebook showed the animal had taken a sizeable bite out of the back of the vessel, made of carbon fibre.

The man, who was not injured in the attack, miraculously managed to flag down a passing boat, which ironically was on its way out to install a drum line.

He has since returned to the water in a borrowed canoe to continue training for a competition this weekend.

Coffs Harbour Yacht Club commodore said the area currently had “plague proportions” of sharks.

Dorsal Shark Reports co-founder Sarah Beardmore said it was unsurprising that more sharks had been reported for the popular tourist area since the catastrophic floods earlier this year.

The canoeist had a sizeable chunk taken from his carbon fibre vessel. Picture: Facebook

“Post floods we’re going to see even more sharks, just because there’s a lot more animals in the water and washing up that there wasn’t before,” Ms Beardmore told news.com.au.

She added it was likely there were more sharks around also because of the migrating whales.

While community reports had been unseasonably high, higher numbers of official reports were likely to be influenced by improved tracking systems rolled out by NSW’s Shark Smart organisation.

“The Department of Primary Industries’ Shark Smart has been setting up strong tag and release systems,” Ms Beardmore said.

“It means they’re actively tagging and releasing more, and setting up more buoys, so that will create more reports.”

While NSW accounted for 60 per cent of the country’s shark reports, it also had the most sophisticated tracking systems, just ahead of Western Australia.

There were typically more sighting reports from members of the public in the summer than winter, Ms Beardmore added.

More than 1400 people commented after the photo was shared to Facebook on Tuesday, with many saying how surprised they were at the shark going for carbon fibre.

“I bet the shark has a nasty case of indigestion now,” one respondent remarked.

“Ouch! Must have been hungry or angry. Glad he is OK,” another wrote.

Ms Beardmore reminded the public to avoid swimming near river inlets as well as at dawn and dusk.

Originally published as Huge shark bites canoe in half, man flags down boat in ‘plagued’ waters