Surfer breaks his silence about horrific shark attack: “I am truly grateful”

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A 33-year-old surfer has just spoken about the horrific experience of being attacked by a great white shark in California.

Michael “Jared” Trainor told Fox News Digital that he no longer goes surfing alone after the October 2022 attack at Centerville Beach in Ferndale that could have cost him his life.

“People have died from this thing and I was close to losing my own life,” he said. “I’m really grateful that I was able to recover from it.”

The ordeal began when he spotted a “large black silhouette” underwater just before the attack. He then felt a strange sensation on his knee, followed by a “crunching” sound as the predator’s teeth sank into his leg.

“It felt like a dog was trying to get into my wetsuit,” Trainor said, adding that he “managed to give it a couple of good kicks.”

The kicks were enough to free his leg, and he used his board to get back to shore and away from the great white shark, which was estimated to be about five meters long and weighed over 450 kilograms.

Another surfer in the parking lot saw the attack and ran to shore to help.

“When I got up and hit the sand, I realized my whole leg was basically ripped open, and I was shocked that I could still walk,” Trainor recalled. “I was bleeding very badly.”

He said the other surfer had his leg unbuckled with the dog leash until paramedics arrived and took him to Redwood Memorial Hospital in Fortuna, California.

Trainor initially thought he had been attacked by a seal – until he saw a shark bite on his surfboard. The shark had caused six cuts on Trainor’s inner thigh, a tear in his knee and several bone injuries. He had to undergo surgery and physical therapy before he could ride the waves again.

“I still surf the same beach quite often, but now I’m with a group of guys there and we all communicate with each other when we go out so we can have a buddy in the water with us,” Trainor said.

Stephen Kajiura, a professor of biological sciences at Florida Atlantic University specializing in sharks, said: The Independent that the number of recent attacks was “somewhat high” but was the natural consequence of the larger crowds in the water in summer.

Another reason for the increased shark activity is small bait fish that swim near the shore and which the sharks feed on, Kajiura said.

In June, Florida saw three shark attacks within a month. In the United States, three more attacks were reported in June, one in Southern California and another in Hawaii, one of which resulted in the death of a swimmer.

A series of shark attacks also marred Fourth of July celebrations, leaving several people injured. A shark attacked beachgoers in Texas swimming in shallow water on July 4, the same day a shark bit an Ohio tourist in Florida.

According to the International Shark Attack File for 2023, the United States has the most shark attacks of any country, with 36 cases, or 52 percent.