Teen boy loses leg in shark attack

CAPE SAN BLAS, Fla. – Relaxing on the white-sand beach Monday morning, 15-year-old Krissy Carte fixed her eyes on three guys fishing in the surf.
About 60 feet offshore, the boys were standing on a sandbar, their lines cast into the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Suddenly, one of them lurched backward.
“He just threw his head back and screamed,” said Krissy, a visitor from West Virginia.
Hours later, doctors amputated the right leg of Craig Adam Hutto, 16, of Lebanon, Tenn., the second teenage tourist to be attacked by a shark off Florida’s Panhandle in the past three days.
Craig was attacked about 11:30 a.m. Monday off Cape San Blas in Gulf County, about 100 miles east of where 14-year-old Jamie Marie Daigle of Gonzales, La., was killed after a shark mutilated her leg off the coast of Destin.
Craig was taken to Bay Medical Center in Panama City, where he initially was listed in critical condition but was upgraded to stable after surgery, officials said.
His family members were at the hospital and declined to talk to reporters.
Early Monday evening, people still on the beach at Cape San Blas recalled in subdued voices the horrible scene they had witnessed hours before.
Paula Picket, a Gulf County spokeswoman, said Craig was reeling in his catch when the shark attacked.
The boy was fishing with his brother and a friend and already had caught several fish. Pickett said the boys were in waist- to chest-deep water and facing the Gulf, where the sandbar drops off steeply.
“All of that may have increased his risk of being attacked,” Pickett said.
After the attack, more than 40 miles of beaches in Gulf County were closed while sheriff’s officials patrolled the coastline by air and sea, Pickett said. Beaches were scheduled to reopen at 11 a.m. Tuesday if no unusual shark activity was spotted.
Pickett said deputies were distributing leaflets with instructions on how to reduce the risk of shark encounters, such as avoiding swimming far from shore, using body boards in deep water or wearing shiny jewelry while swimming.
Shark experts urged beachgoers not to panic. At a news conference Monday, Erich Ritter of the Shark Research Institute insisted, “There’s not even a remote chance that this is the same shark.”
Ritter said he saw no pattern indicating an increase in shark activity.