Doctors on vacation help save victims of shark attack

WALTON COUNTY, Fla. (WKRG) – A group of medical professionals vacationing in Florida rushed to the aid of a young girl who was attacked by a shark on Friday.

The incident occurred at Rosemary Beach in Walton County. Two 15-year-old girls were in waist-deep water with some friends when they were attacked, the South Walton Fire District said.

According to authorities, one of the girls suffered serious injuries to her thigh and hand, while the other girl suffered only minor foot injuries.

Ryan Forbess and Mohammad Ali are both doctors and friends who vacation in the area every summer with their families. They were boogie boarding with their children when they heard people panicking on the beach, the two Nexstars told WKRG.

“We all ran out of the water,” Forbess said. “I grabbed my son. He grabbed his daughter. As we approached the beach, I looked to my left and saw the murky red water from the shark attack.”

When they returned to land, their medical training immediately came in handy. Some paramedics and trauma nurses, who were also on vacation, rushed to help.

The group placed tourniquets on the teenagers’ legs and hands and applied pressure to their wounds.

“When I looked down at her and saw the severity of the injury, I realized that everyone with medical knowledge had to help,” Ali said.

Forbess and Ali said they did not know the other medical professionals who helped the girl, but that did not matter at the time because they all had one goal in mind: saving her life.

“We might as well have worked with them for years,” Forbess said. “It was incredible. Somehow… it was God’s will that everyone was there at the same time to help.”

After the girl was admitted to hospital, Forbes and Ali spoke to the family and were told that she was expected to survive.

Less than two hours before that attack, a 45-year-old woman was bitten by a shark near WaterSound Beach, about 2 miles from Rosemary Beach. She suffered severe injuries to her abdomen and arm, and part of her arm had to be amputated, South Walton Fire Chief Ryan Crawford said at a news conference. She was flown to a trauma center.

On Saturday, Walton County Sheriff’s officers patrolling the waters by boat spotted a 14-foot hammerhead shark near Santa Rosa Beach, which they said is not unusual. Sheriff’s officials say they do not know what type of shark attacked the swimmers on Friday.

“We want to reiterate that sharks are always present in the Gulf,” the sheriff’s office said in a social media post Saturday. “Swimmers and beachgoers should exercise caution while swimming and be aware of their surroundings.”

Experts say shark attacks are rare. According to the University of Florida’s International Shark Attack File, there were 69 unprovoked bites worldwide last year, 10 of which were fatal. That’s more than the recent average of six deaths per year.

The Associated Press contributed to this article.