In both cases, the kids were swimming about 20 yards offshore, in water that was waist-deep, The Washington Post reports.
The victims were airlifted to New Hanover Regional Medical Center in Wilmington, The Guardian reports. The youths were in critical condition on arrival, hospital spokeswoman Martha Harlan said.
The names of children haven’t been released, but their conditions have since been upgraded to “fair.”
“I saw someone carry this girl [out of the water] and people were swarming around and trying to help,” said Steve Bouser, who had just started his week-long vacation. “It was quite terrible.”
The young girl bled heavily, so people applied makeshift tourniquets and kept asking her questions in an effort to keep her conscious.
“It was quite nightmarish,” Bouser said.
“It was so much like a scene from Jaws,” said his wife, Brenda Bouser.
Mayor Betty Wallace told CNN that shark attacks are very rare at Oak Island, the Guardian reports. In fact, she said she couldn’t remember one occurring before the attacks last weekend.
The attacks occurred during the high tide near Ocean Crest Pier, a popular place among beach-goers.
“At the pier this time of year, I’m sure the beach was packed,” Wallace said.
All-terrain vehicles, sent out by local officials, roamed the beach to get everyone out of the water. The Brunswick County Sheriff’s Office was planning to send a helicopter to patrol the coast, she noted.
It’s reported that red flags were hoisted at most Brunswick County beaches.
Town Manager Tim Holloman says that in 16 years, he’s never seen anything like what happened on Sunday.
“Oak Island is still a safe place,” he told ABC News, per the Guardian. “We’re monitoring the situation. This is highly unusual.”
The beaches will be open on Monday, but visitors will be encouraged not to enter the water.
“The Brunswick County Sheriff’s Department will have Marine One and their helicopter support to monitor the coastline for any activities tomorrow,” Holloman said.
Indeed, people are being cautious, the Washington Post reports.
Having spent the last 20 years going to Oak Island for vacation, Larry James, of Asheville, N.C., says that he and his wife won’t let their granddaughter Maggie, 6, go out far.
“We won’t be out in the water so far,” he said. “Ankle deep at the most.”
Many other people were keeping out of the water completely, said Lori Little, of Claremont, N.C. She was vacationing with her husband.
“I would describe the beach as empty as compared to when we were here yesterday,” she said. “I don’t think people are quite ready to get in the water yet.”
Deputies on boats and helicopters who were monitoring the water after the attacks spotted a seven-foot shark in the area where the attacks occurred. Another shark was also seen on Monday morning.
The girl has tissue damage to her lower left leg, and surgeons amputated her left arm below the elbow. The teen boy’s left arm was amputated below his shoulder.
In 2014, there were only 72 unprovoked shark attacks on humans worldwide, and 52 were in the U.S., the International Shark Attack File (ISAF) at the Florida Museum of Natural History reports. Three of the attacks — all of which occurred outside the U.S. — were fatal, the Washington Post reports.
George Burgess, a shark researcher who oversees the database, says he only knows of two other multiple shark attacks on the same beach in one day.
“It may be that there are big schools of fish out in the surf zone that are attracting the sharks,” he noted.
Over the past few decades, shark attacks like the ones that occurred on the North Carolina coast during this past week have increased, but researchers say this points to human, not shark, behavior.
In the past decade, North Carolina has averaged around three shark attacks each year, and that’s up a little bit from one per year on average during the 1990’s, the ISAF says, according to The News and Observer. Similar increases have been reported nationwide.
It’s not however, because there are more sharks. Many shark species are seriously in decline due to overfishing and habitat loss. Instead, the seemingly more frequent attacks are due to the fact that there are more people in the water. Better reporting also plays a part.
“We’ve all been close to a shark in our lifetime if we’ve been in the water,” Burgess said. “Happily, sharks don’t eat human beings.”
The majority of shark bites result in minor cuts to feet and hands. Most likely these bites are from smaller sharks mistaking the splashing of an arm or leg for the movements of a fish or any other prey they might eat. Four of these incidents occurred off the North Carolina coast last summer.
Of 90 shark bites documented in North Carolina, only 11 proved fatal, ISAF reports. There were 156 deaths from 1,974 incidents reported nationwide during this time.
Burgess says that due to the seriousness of the injuries, the recent attacks in North Carolina likely indicate that a larger shark was involved.
There are over 350 species of sharks, but only a handful of species can be considered dangerous to humans. Bull, tiger, and white sharks are considered “the Big Three” because of the frequency and severity of their brushes with humans. In summer bull and tiger sharks migrate into North Carolina coastal waters to seek warmer waters and food, the News and Observer reports.
While sharks may seem scary and dangerous, we are a far greater threat to them than they are to us. Sadly, a 2013 paper in the journal Marine Policy estimated that some 97 million sharks were killed in 2010, a loss of about 7.9 percent to the total shark population. It’s a rate far steeper than most species can keep up with, the Washington Post reports.
According to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature Shark Specialist Group, at least 28 percent of shark species are at risk of extinction.
Note: The video above has helpful tips for avoiding shark attack.
