AUCKLAND – A shark possibly over 4 meters long killed a swimmer near a popular New Zealand beach Wednesday, then disappeared after police attempting to save the man fired gunshots at it.
Muriwai Beach near Auckland was closed after the fatal attack, one of only a dozen or so in New Zealand in the past 180 years.
Pio Mose, who was fishing at the beach, told The New Zealand Herald he saw the swimmer struggling against the “huge” shark. “All of a sudden there was blood everywhere,” Mose said. “I was shaking, scared, panicked.”
Police Inspector Shawn Rutene said the swimmer, who was in his 40s, was about 200 meters offshore when the shark attacked. He said police went out in inflatable surf-lifesaving boats and shot at the shark, which they estimate was 3.5 to more than 4 meters long.
“It rolled over and disappeared,” Rutene said.
Police recovered the body of the swimmer, whose name was not immediately released because his relatives had yet to be notified. They did not say what species of shark was involved in the attack.
Shark expert Clinton Duffy said New Zealand is a hot spot for great white sharks, and other potentially lethal species, but that attacks are rare. He estimated that only 12 to 14 people have been killed by sharks in New Zealand since record keeping began in the 1830s.