A Florida man says he owes his life to two nurses who happened to be nearby when a shark bit his foot in shallow water off the Florida Keys.
David “Dave” Daniel, 43, was at a sandbar near Boca Grande Key, about 14 miles west of Key West, on Sunday, Aug. 23. Daniel told NBC 6 South Florida he was walking in roughly two feet of water when someone in his group spotted a shark.
Daniel estimated the shark was six or seven feet long and said it appeared to be a nurse shark. He said the shark turned toward him after he moved, came between his legs, bit the top of his foot, and released him.
The bite caused serious bleeding. Nearby boaters rushed to Daniel, and among the people who came to his aid were registered nurses Christopher Green and Courtney McMurray.
Two Feet Deep
Daniel’s account does not begin with a deep-water swim or a diver approaching a shark.
He was standing on a sandbar.
Daniel told WSVN the shark had been moving parallel to the beach before turning toward him. After it bit his foot, Daniel said, the animal let go and swam away.
The brief encounter left a much longer problem behind.
A 911 dispatch recording described an arterial bleed, while Green, a registered nurse and retired Army veteran, recognized that Daniel was losing blood quickly.
Green and another nurse worked to control the bleeding and elevate Daniel’s leg. McMurray told NBC News that Daniel appeared to be in shock and was drifting in and out of conversation.
“He looked like he was in rough shape,” McMurray said.
The nurses used what they had available, including a belt fashioned into a tourniquet, while someone contacted the U.S. Coast Guard.
The Right Boat
The Coast Guard response did not simply consist of an airlift from the sandbar.
The boaters began taking Daniel back toward Key West, and the Coast Guard escorted their vessel to a pier where Monroe County Fire Rescue was waiting, WSVN reported.
U.S. Coast Guard Machine Technician 2nd Class Louis Bosc described Daniel’s injury as life-threatening and said he coordinated with Sector Key West and emergency medical personnel to have help waiting at the pier.
Daniel was then flown about 128 miles to Jackson South Medical Center in Southwest Miami-Dade.
By then, the nurses had bought him something considerably harder to replace than the blood he had lost: time.
Daniel later told WSVN, “If it weren’t for them, I would 100% be dead on the beach.”
Nurse Shark
Daniel says the shark that bit him was a nurse shark. The Coast Guard publicly confirmed a shark bite to his lower leg but did not independently identify the species in the accounts reviewed by Guessing Headlights.
If Daniel’s identification was correct, a six- or seven-foot animal would not be particularly large for the species.
The Florida Museum of Natural History says adult nurse sharks average about 7.5 to 8 feet long and more than 200 pounds. The species is common in shallow waters around South Florida and the Florida Keys.
Nurse sharks are generally not aggressive and normally swim away when approached, according to the museum. They are bottom-dwelling sharks that feed on animals including crustaceans, mollusks, and small fish.
Docile does not mean harmless.
The museum says a disturbed nurse shark can deliver a powerful bite capable of causing serious injury. Its jaws can maintain such a strong grip that some bites have required surgical instruments to free the animal.
In Daniel’s case, however, he said the shark released his foot on its own.
Long Recovery
Daniel underwent surgery the night of the bite and a second operation two days later, according to a fundraiser created for him by friend Robyn Corliss.
He was discharged from the hospital on Wednesday, Aug. 26.
Daniel, who lives in Silver Springs and works as an exterminator, is expected to be unable to walk for six to eight weeks and will need extensive physical therapy, according to the fundraiser. Corliss said he could be out of work for months and does not have health insurance.
Daniel told WSVN after his release that his foot remained wrapped and immobilized in a boot.
The man bitten by what he says was a nurse shark now has two nurses, several boaters, the Coast Guard, and medical crews between that afternoon on the sandbar and the recovery ahead.
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