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Man bitten by shark at Broken Head, great white spotted nearby

WITNESSES have described their horror when they saw a man with a “massive chunk out of his leg” after he was bitten by a shark.

Liz BurkeLiz Burke
@lizeburke
2 min read
October 24, 2016 - 2:31PM

A SURFER saw the tail of a shark as it attempted to take a bite out of his leg in northern NSW. All beaches in the Byron Bay area are closed after a 36-year-old man suffered puncture wounds to his left upper thigh when he was surfing at Broken Head, near Byron Bay, about 7:30am this morning after he was attacked and knocked off his surfboard.

The Gold Coast Bulletin reports the shark “came up from underneath the man’s surfboard as he waited for a wave”.

He was able to “fend off” the shark and escape to shore, where surfers close by helped to treat the wounds.

It is not known which species of shark attacked the man but a series of great white shark spottings chasing dolphins in the past week have lifeguards on watch.

“He was surprisingly calm,” witness Aaron Hoffman told the Bulletin.

“He wasn’t showing any real signs of pain - I think he might have been in shock.”

Early reports suggested the man drove himself to Byron Central Hospital, but NSW Police said in a statement: “A friend assisted the man and drove him to Byron Bay Hospital.”

The man has now been discharged. It is understood he received “dozens” of stitches.

“There was a group of guys coming in and they were starting to walk back up the beach waving their boards around,” witness Stuart Holland told Nine News.

“One of them was definitely limping, had blood running down from the bottom of his wetsuit, quite a lot of blood.

“They were waving their boards trying to indicate to other surfers. At that point I started to panic about my kids.

“[They were] paddling out to where the main pack was, which was thinning down by that point because obviously they’d heard, but my kids hadn’t.”

Mr Holland’s daughter, Belinda said: “His board went flying into the air.

“He got a massive chunk out of his leg and his side and it was a lot of blood. It was pretty freaky.”

An image of a man with cuts to his leg was posted to Twitter following reports of the attack.

User Geoffrey John Knapp posted the image, which has now been deleted, with the caption: “One very lucky surfer today at Broken Head NSW Australia.”

Lifeguards and police closed all beaches in the Byron Bay area. It is the third shark attack in the northern NSW region in a month. Authorities will decide if and when to reopen the beaches Tuesday morning.

Sharks have been previously spotted swimming among surfers in the popular surfing area.

The last shark attack at Broken Head was in February 2015 where a surfer was hospitalised with lacerations to his back after being lashed by a two to three metre shark. 

Three-metre great white shark, spotted at Broken Head earlier this year.
Three-metre great white shark, spotted at Broken Head earlier this year.

The popular surfing spot is about 25km north of Ballina, where a series of incidents has prompted the NSW Government to rethink its shark strategy.

Since February last year there have been four attacks along a 1km stretch of Ballina coastline, including one fatal incident.

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Original URL: https://www.news.com.au/national/nsw-act/news/man-bitten-by-shark-at-broken-head-reports/news-story/cc28e929384b76cda96366d79ad68603