Surfer beats off shark but needs 100 stitches

Jay Catherall, a 32-year-old wildlife photographer from Worcester, was knocked from his board at Wackey Point, a remote spot near the mouth of the Kei River, north of East London on the Indian Ocean coast.

"Jay had just completed a ride on a huge barrel wave and was beginning to paddle in when I saw him give the shark warning symbol, an upturned hand to the forehead," said Mr Catherall's girlfriend, Nicola Garner, also from Worcester.

Ms Garner, also a wildlife photographer, said they were at the end of an eight-month trip through Africa.

"Other surfers said he was knocked off his board and taken down under the water, but Jay can't remember that," Ms Garner told The Scotsman.

"He just remembers getting back on to his board. He assumes the adrenalin was flowing because he had been terribly bitten."

Ms Garner said her boyfriend was incredibly calm but "in a mess" by the time he reached the beach, on Wednesday morning.

"He was bleeding severely, and the district surgeon said later that the shark had just missed severing the main artery at the back of one of Jay's legs.

"On the beach we just saw lots of raw flesh. His wetsuit seemed to be holding his buttocks together, but fortunately no large chunks of flesh had been torn off."

Billy Lawrence, supervisor of the emergency service in the Kei River area, said he believed Mr Catherall was attacked either by a ragged tooth shark or a Zambezi shark.

He said the waters off the mouth of the Kei River are currently rich in every kind of sea life as the annual sardine run begins.

Every year at this time, billions of sardines in huge shoals migrate 1,000 miles eastwards from the southern Cape to the warmer waters of Zululand, pursued by every size of fish, sharks, dolphins, seals and sea birds in an extended feeding chain.

Mr Lawrence said the surfer appears to have got caught up in the feeding frenzy.

"His wounds were some of the ugliest I've seen, but he's out of danger and insisted on returning to his hotel rather than go to hospital," said Mr Lawrence. "He's so lucky to be alive. He can be grateful he's only got a sore butt. He's not going to be sitting on that for many weeks."

Mr Lawrence said many hundreds of ragged tooths, known locally as "raggies", and Zambezis are running with the sardines. "Everything is eating everything else," he said.

It was the second attack on a British surfer in two months. Teacher Chris Sullivan, from Cornwall, punched away a great white shark that bit his right leg while he was surfing with friends near Cape Town. He needed 200 stitches after wrenching his leg from the mouth of the 13ft great white.