NORTH MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. — A quick-thinking 11-year-old girl is safe after a near miss with a shark off South Carolina’s coast, and her mother captured the entire encounter on video.
Nicole Oister shared the footage with WMBF of her daughter, Sara, boogie-boarding on Monday along the North Myrtle Beach shoreline when a black fin rose out of the water.
“I was taking video of her, and all of a sudden she starts running out of water,” Oister told WTVD. “She said she saw a fin coming up out of the water towards her ... I looked back on the video to see if I had captured it. I did.”
Oister told WMBF that the close encounter did not stop her daughter from getting back in the water, though.
“She’s nervous for sure, but we know that we’re in ‘their home,’ so we’ll continue to swim with caution,” Oister told the TV station.
George Burgess, director emeritus of the Florida Program for Shark Research, told WTVD that researchers have not detected anything unusual regarding interactions between humans and sharks, but the “density of humans in the waters is higher than ever.”
“We’re engaging in aquatic activities that put us at risk,” Burgess told the TV station.
According to researchers, nearly 40 species of sharks can be found off Myrtle Beach’s coast, but only one shark attack has been recorded on South Carolina beaches this year, WSOC reported.
©2021 Cox Media Group
:quality(70)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/cmg/WRE45HXGLFA53BMDVGZXFP2VTA.jpg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/cmg/VJGHDQCCXFBE5NWSC5QPZ2YDWA.jpg)
:quality(70)/d1hfln2sfez66z.cloudfront.net/04-25-2024/t_890b024e4146412fba10831bc7dfacf2_name_5as__Tesla_Autopilot_Ax_transfer_frame_0.jpeg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/cmg/OALVBR6QTFWNDCGBQCCIM2QLJQ.jpg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/cmg/IPIXRAQD4KXZGRHJ52HJAS7CAE.png)