by Corey Bennett
Around 1 p.m. Tuesday, a 19-year-old man who was kayaking on the San Mateo coast was attacked viciously by what officials believe to be a great white shark. The shark knocked him off of his kayak before biting through the middle of it, causing the man to be forced to swim an estimated 500 feet back to shore. Luckily, he was able to swim back to shore uninjured.
“We haven’t recovered the kayak, so we weren’t able to take a look at the teeth marks, so everything makes us think that it was a great white shark,” says Sgt. Stan Kopas, who was the first ranger on the scene to speak to the kayaker.
After some investigations, it is believed that the shark that attacked the man was roughly 10 feet long.
A local fisherman told NBC Bay Area’s Thom Jenson that this was the same spot where he was also attacked while kayaking in 2017. In that attack, the shark grabbed the front of his kayak. He was also able to escape the shark uninjured.
Officials have counted six other attacks in roughly the same area over the past decade. Luckily, the kayakers were able to make it out uninjured each time.
A marine biologist told NBC that these sharks are most likely drawn to the water because there is a massive increase in the number of sea lions and seals who are in the area around this time of year. The sharks are most likely mistaking the kayaks for food.
As of now, none of the kayaks have been found and are most likely still out there somewhere in the water.
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