Shark victim from Wendell, Idaho

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – A shark estimated at 6 feet long bit a U.S. tourist earlier this week while she swam in a popular bioluminescent bay at night, doctors said Thursday.

The woman, identified as 27-year-old Lydia Strunk, faces several months of physical therapy and will remain hospitalized until the weekend, Dr. Ernesto Torres said.

The victim is a law student at the University of San Diego in California and is from Wendell, Idaho, said her mother, Patty Strunk, who arrived in Puerto Rico on Thursday.

The wound is about 10 inches long and runs from below her knee to the ankle, said Dr. Pablo Rodriguez, trauma director at the Rio Piedras Medical Center.

Strunk is expected to make a full recovery but will likely have some nerve damage and limited movement in her right foot, he said.

Doctors repaired four tendons that are used for flexing the foot, and it will take up to five months for Strunk’s damaged nerves to grow back, he said.

Shark attacks are rare in Puerto Rico. Only seven attacks have ever been reported, two of them fatal, with the last death occurring in 1924.