Harrowing First-Hand Accounts From Shark Attack Survivors
Heather Boswell was 19 years old when she was attacked by a Great White Shark while swimming off the coast of Chile.
Boswell, who was working on a research ship, was taking a break with some of her crew members when the shark grabbed both of her legs and pulled her under the water. The horrifying scene was all captured on home video.
Boswell's colleagues sprung into action. One person grabbed her arms while another beat the shark with a stick.
It was only when the young researcher was safely on the boat that she looked down and realized most of her left leg was gone. Boswell is living with a prosthesis today.
New Zealander Andrea Rush was swimming near an anchored yacht off Maleukula Island in the South Pacific when she was attacked.
It sank its teeth into her leg and whipped her around. Rush was able to break free by punching the animal in the nose.
Rush swam to the yacht, where the skipper and a friend hoisted her out of the shark-infested waters.
Rush survived, but not unscathed. She needed a six-hour operation to save her leg.
A Bull shark nearly cost Dr. Erich Ritter, a shark behaviorist, his life while he was filming an episode for the 2002 "Shark Week" in Walker's Cay, Bahamas.
Ritter was standing in shallow water as part of an experiment to show that sharks are not interested in humans as food.
That's when a Bull shark came from directly behind him and bit him in the calf. The shark tore off the muscle and opened an artery.
The scientist was immediately flown to a Florida hospital where doctors managed to save his leg in an eight-hour operation.
Vaughan Hill, a commercial diver, blacked out after a 15-foot Great White ripped into his arm with its powerful jaws.
Hill was harvesting paua, a kind of edible sea snail, off New Zealand's Pitt Island at the time of the accident.
He spent three weeks in a coma and two years at the hospital in recovery. Today, Hill is missing his right arm.
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