Swimmer killed by stingray, two mauled by sharks

SYDNEY: A swimmer died after a rare suspected stingray attack off an Australian beach while another two people were mauled in separate shark encounters this weekend.

The 42-year-old’s death came more than a decade after world-renowned Crocodile Hunter Steve Irwin was killed when a stingray barb punctured his chest while he was filming on the famed Great Barrier Reef.

The man was in waters off Lauderdale Beach some 23km from Hobart in the southern island state of Tasmania on Saturday when he “sustained a puncture wound to his lower abdomen... possibly inflicted by a marine animal”, police said.

He was brought onto the beach by friends but suffered a heart attack and was unable to be resuscitated, police added.

“It’s consistent with (a stingray injury) but further investigation and examination of the deceased may be able to give a bit more of a concrete fact on that,” Tasmania Police Senior Constable Brett Bowering told the Sunday Tasmanian.

In the first shark attack of the weekend, a man taking part in a surf lesson off the east coast suffered serious cuts after an encounter on Saturday.

The 24-year-old was wading waist-deep in waters off Seven Mile Beach some 130km south of Sydney when he “felt a forceful lashing motion against his legs”, New South Wales Ambulance said.

He had “significant cuts and haemorrhage as well as several puncture wounds to his wetsuit and right leg... and cuts to his hand”, NSW Ambulance duty operations manager Inspector Jordan Emery told reporters on Saturday.

That attack was followed by another yesterday off the north coast, when a teenage boy was bitten on his arm and leg while spearfishing, police said.

The 17-year-old was spearfishing from a vessel off the coast of Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory when he sustained “significant injuries” to his arm, St John Ambulance said.

He said shark encounters in the NT were unusual, adding: “I’ve been around a long time and I’ll be honest, I can’t remember a shark attack.” — AFP