An 8-year-old boy was bitten by a shark while snorkeling off the coast of Key Largo, Florida, officials said.
The child was spearfishing with his father and sibling just before 3.30 p.m. on Monday, several miles offshore at Horseshoe Reef when a shark bit him above the knee, according to the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office.
The father flagged down a nearby dive vessel, operated by Horizon Divers, with its crew rendering immediate aid and chaperoning the family back to Garden Cove Marina.
The boy was airlifted by Trauma Star to the Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center in Miami for emergency treatment for the bite on his leg, authorities said. According to 7 News Miami, the boy’s condition was described as “severe.”
Monroe Sheriff Rick Ramsay confirmed to the Miami Herald that the boy underwent surgery on Monday evening. Officials have not released further details about the victim’s condition.
The U.S. Coast Guard and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission were notified following the attack, with audio from emergency calls obtained by CBS News stating: “It’s going to be a victim of a shark bite to the leg.”
According to MCSO emergency dispatch audio over Broadcastify, deputies said that there was a “significant amount of blood loss” and that the “patient is pale.”
According to the dispatch, emergency personnel applied two tourniquets and a bandage “to control the bleeding.”
The Labor Day attack comes just over a year after the last reported shark bite incident in Monroe County.
Jose Abrue Hernandez, 37, was rushed to the hospital in July 2024 after being bitten by an 8ft bull shark on the chest and both legs while spearfishing on a reef near Key West, the MCSO said in a statement at the time.
Hernandez was airlifted by the same helicopter as the 8-year-old boy, the Trauma Star, to a Miami hospital. He is believed to have survived.
