Posted on 10/22/2011 3:39:02 PM PDT by jazusamo
Michelle Harris/Towsurfer.com
Bobby Gumm of Newport was attacked by a 16- to 17-foot great white shark while surfing last week, losing a good-sized chomp from his board.
NEWPORT -- On a deceptively calm morning last week, Bobby Gumm floated on his surfboard on the water off South Beach State Park.
"I was enjoying that feeling of being a surfer out there by myself," said Gumm, a 41-year-old father of four. "It was peaceful. I was sitting there in heaven, pretty much."
Within seconds, heaven turned to hell, as Gumm became the mistaken prey of the biggest living nightmare in the ocean.
"I thought I was dead," Gumm said. "I thought I was just like a ghost when I came out. I didn't know if I was alive or if this was some kind of afterlife. It was unbelievable."
Thursday started like so many other mornings when you're a surfer on the Oregon Coast lucky enough to have the hours free to do what you love. In this case, Gumm won those hours by trading shifts with another employee at Instant Replay Sports after reading the surf report the night before.
He drove to South Beach State Park and, as he always does, climbed onto the dunes to check out the waves. "They were in the two- to three-feet range," he said. "Decent, small surf."
By the time he suited up and carried his board to the beach, as many as 30 other surfers were fanned out across the expanse of Pacific. Intermediate surfers stick closer to the jetty. Advanced guys like Gumm, who grew up in Oahu and has surfed for 25 years, head farther out. On this day, Gumm was enjoying a stretch about 200 yards out.
Gumm had caught a few rides before the water turned flat about 11 a.m.
"I was just sitting out there looking at the ocean, thinking what a beautiful day," said Gumm, who holds down two jobs, the second cooking nights at Bay 839. "I was doing what I wanted to do that day. Relaxing."
When he felt something rubbing against him, touching his foot, he figured it was a seal or sea lion. He'd seen sharks before, but always far away. "Usually, I heard, people see them and they bump you and go away." But he wasn't thinking shark just then.
"I didn't really look down," he said. "It was just my natural instinct to kick that thing rubbing on me." That's when he knew this was no seal. "It was solid. SOLID. I thought it could have been a whale. I looked down and saw a 16- to 17-foot great white shark under me, a full half of his body rubbing on my legs. Weirdly, I didn't panic. For a second, I thought he was going away."
Then, with a force, Gumm struggles to explain, the shark was in front of him.
He yelled for help. "I kind of seen everybody, all the guys," Gumm said. "I got the feeling they couldn't do anything."
Fellow surfer Ron Clifford heard the call.
"All of the sudden I see the water churning," Clifford said. "It looked like piranhas, you know how they get in a frenzy. I called to a friend and he said, 'Wow, there is something happening to Bobby,' and then we saw the 2-foot dorsal fin coming up, and at the same time it looked like Old Faithful, the geyser shot up. I see the tail of his board shoot for the sky."
The strike launched Gumm into air. "It was one of the most intense feelings, the noise and everything," he said. "Like an explosion, a big shotgun blast."
When he came down, Gumm began treading water, only to see the shark an arm's length away. The nose of his surfboard was gone, and next to him was two feet of dorsal fin.
He scrambled onto the board, lifted his legs up and paddled.
"I closed my eyes and paddled and paddled. I thought the shark was right behind me. I was praying to God. It was the longest paddle of my life. It took me an easy eight minutes."
In the two days since the encounter, Gumm has had plenty of nightmares and often wakes up soaked in sweat. "My mind's been playing head games, thinking I shouldn't even be alive."
By rights, he probably shouldn't be, said Mark A. Marks, a local white shark biologist.
"Had Bobby been prone, he would have been killed probably instantly," Marks said. "He would have never known what hit him. That's how fast it would have been. The kind of force involved in the shark striking the board is what a white shark does when it is trying to incapacitate its prey."
Marks suspects the shark was primed to attack, possibly fresh from hunting a seal that another surfer spotted just before the attack. When Gumm kicked it, suddenly the shark knew it was dealing with something alive.
"It is extremely rare for a person to be struck by that kind of force," said Marks. "It was a lightning strike. Wrong place, wrong time."
Most mornings before Gumm enters the water, he has something of a ritual he performs. He prays.
"I stretch on the beach. I say my prayer to the water. I learned this tradition from the older guys in Hawaii growing up. That's what they do when they get in the water, respect it. You pray to God to protect you."
On Thursday morning, Gumm thinks there's a good chance God did exactly that.
"It had to be something," he said. "I should be dead now. It was one of those little miracles."
(video at link)
That happened in Humboldt County to someone I went to high school with.
But the bit out of his board was nothing compared to that. Wow.
Meanwhile, in Australia... “Witnesses on his boat saw a large amount of bubbles surfacing, followed by the diver’s body which police said had obviously fatal injuries.”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2796583/posts
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-15414385
Thanks for linking the fatal attack in Australia, I just finished reading it and thought about linking it. Very sad.
What kind of surfing can one do on a “deceptively calm morning”?
Darn near prophetic words!
Surfer interview fail
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-5F_7DwPpo&feature=related
The re-mix
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GgQ5BJTSv9U&feature=related
A young lady not so lucky - (and great movie)
Soul Surfer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isjY34VD5jE
“...Gumm became the mistaken prey of the biggest living nightmare in the ocean.”
How was he “mistaken prey”? He wasn’t a seal but he still would have made a tasty treat. I don’t think the shark took him for anything other than food.
Of course animals don’t mean to hurt us they are just misunderstood.
Yes, Bethany Hamilton is an inspiration after what happened to her, it could have been a lot worse but losing an arm is a real tragedy.
I haven’t seen the movie but will make a point of it, I know the wife and I will enjoy it and there’s few we do enjoy anymore.
Yet another reason I stay OUT of the ocean; I love being on the shore, MAYBE piddlin’ around snorkeling in the tide pools but not IN it. *SHUDDER*
I avoid large fresh water bodies, too. Sturgeon & your larger Northerns/Muskies can bite ya but good!
*SHUDDER*
Maybe I sound like a wimp, but I breath AIR and don’t have gills for a REASON, LOL!
I hear you, Diana.
I grew up in southern CA and was a swimmer and beach addict. Thought nothing of swimming and diving in ocean waters even though there were a few shark encounters that ending badly back then for others.
There’s no way I’d do it now even if I could, especially off the OR and northern CA coasts. The odds may not be too great of being attacked but if it’s you it’s 100% and that’d be a bad way to go. LOL!
OK. One more... *SHUDDER*
Bet I’ll have dreams tonight that my bed is a boat and I’m floating in shark-infested waters.
So...THANKS A LOT, LOL! :)
LOL! Anything in the ocean water is a food source to something...........
I lived in Florida for a while, and I never, ever went in my pool without checkin' it for gators first.
Big aquatic predators freak me out. Even with bears and such your on land, in a human's element and at least you've got a shot.
But in the water? Your drowning, your disoriented, you can't dip/dodge, play dead or pull out your .45
Great, now Im going to have nightmare's tonight. \:)
“Within seconds, heaven turned to hell, as Gumm became the mistaken prey of the biggest living nightmare in the ocean. “
Silly journalist. The only true “mistaken prey” is when an animal attempts to devour a *nonedible* object.
Humans are edible, and we are not on top of the food chain.
God saved that man’s life. I pray he takes that seriously.
I also think he took it seriously that God saved his life from his words at the end of the article
You pray to God to protect you."
On Thursday morning, Gumm thinks there's a good chance God did exactly that.
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