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07/23/2010 Clayton Schulz ( Florida )

Recent listing of shark attacks 2010 and Shark Attack Related Incidents in 2010.
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alb
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Re: 07/23/2010 Clayton Schulz ( Florida )

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More people in ocean in Jacksonville Beach area means greater shark attack risk, lifeguards and surfers say


By Caren Burmeister, Drew Dixon
After someone was bitten by what is believed to be a shark off Jacksonville's coast for the second time in six weeks, lifeguards and surfers are blaming it on more people in the water, not more sharks.

Clayton Schulz, a 20-year-old pitcher for the University of North Florida Ospreys, was surfing about 4:30 p.m. Friday when something snatched and shook his left foot.

He didn't see what bit him, but Schulz said he could feel teeth and believed it was a shark. He was in stable condition this week at Shands Jacksonville hospital, where he got about 300 stitches to close the wounds.

"He's doing well," his father, Peter Schulz, said on Monday. He said he expects his son will be released from the hospital this week. Doctors have said they expect a nearly full recovery.

The attack is at least the second bite injury reported in Jacksonville Beach since June 10, when a woman was bitten in waist-deep water a few feet from shore. She was treated for a minor wound, which was described as an outline of a small mouth with teeth.

Officials aren't sure it was a shark that bit Schulz. Barracudas, bluefish and stingrays can also bite, said Capt. Thomas Wright of Jacksonville Beach Ocean Rescue. Before June 10, it had been about four years since a shark attack was reported in Jacksonville Beach.

"It's kind of unusual to have two bites that close together," Wright said.

Likely, it's because of the number of people in the water, he said.

There have been no official reports of shark bites in the Ponte Vedra Beach area. The last reported shark bite occurred there last year in the Vilano Beach area, said Jeremy Robshaw, spokesman for St. Johns County Fire Rescue.

Swimmers and surfers must use their judgment about entering the water. Beaches lifeguards post purple warning flags for dangerous marine life. But that's usually when scores of jellyfish arrive and dozens of stings are reported, not when sharks are swimming around.

Sharks are always out there, Wright said.

"That's where the sharks live," he said. "You're in their house. If you're concerned about that, you shouldn't be out there."

When Schulz was bitten, a waist-to-chest-high swell had brought out more surfers than usual, said Mitch Kaufmann, director of the North Florida district of the Eastern Surfing Association. When the surf is decent, few places between Jacksonville Beach and Atlantic Beach aren't crowded, increasing the chance of a shark attack, he said.

"Shark attacks are still so rare that you really don't need to worry about it," Kaufmann said. "You do need to be aware of sharks and keep your eye out, but there are more people in the water than ever, it seems like."

Sharks are so common that some bites aren't even reported, said Tim Ellis, a Ponte Vedra Beach resident and member of the First Coast Wavemasters Society.

In June, Matt Searcy, another surfer in his 20s, was attacked in the Ponte Vedra Beach area and received 30 stitches, but that received no media attention, Ellis said.

He was dismayed by the severity of Schulz's wound. "That's a major deal when it requires 300 stitches," Ellis said. "Anytime you have a shark attack, people who don't regularly go in the ocean hear about it and it makes them fearful."

Jim Dunlop, who owns Mystic Surfboards custom board manufacturing in Jacksonville Beach, said he's had plenty of brushes with sharks along the First Coast over the decades.

He has seen shark fins in the water, one that measured 8 feet from the dorsal to the tail fin, meaning the shark could have been up to 12 feet long.

"I've seen big sharks. They're here," Dunlop said. "You look at the beach any weekend with all the people wading around, I'm surprised there's not more [attacks.]"

Kaufmann predicted the latest attack won't harm enthusiasm for surfing.

On Saturday, the day after Schulz's attack, 150 youths showed up for the Super Grom Clinic on the south side of the fishing pier to learn how to surf.



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alb
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Re: 07/23/2010 Clayton Schulz ( Florida )

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Stuart man survives shark attack in Jacksonville
clayton_schulz.JPG
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STUART, Fla. - A Stuart man is recovering after being bitten by a shark in Jacksonville.

"The shark grabbed me and shook his head a little bit, and I think he kind of realized that he was biting the wrong thing, so he let go," said Clayton Shulz.

The 20-year-old needed 400 stitches to repair the injury to his foot.

Shulz is a baseball player at the University of North Florida. He still has several more surgeries and months of rehab ahead of him.


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alb
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07/23/2010 Clayton Schulz ( Florida )

Post by alb »

Clayton Schulz needed more than 300 stitches to repair the damage after Jacksonville Beach Shark Attack---



UNF athlete bitten while surfing

By Steve Patterson

A University of North Florida baseball player was hospitalized after being bitten by a powerful fish Friday at Jacksonville Beach.

"All I really felt was teeth and tearing," Clayton Schulz said today from a patient room at Shands Jacksonville hospital.

"I'm lucky. I still have a foot, and they expect me to hopefully make close to a 100 percent recovery."

Schulz, a 20-year-old business management major, said he had been surfing near Sixth Avenue South about 4:30 p.m. when his left foot was snatched.

"I was hopping back on my board and the shark came up and grabbed my foot and shook it around a little it and let go," he said.

"I popped right up and got on my board and lifted my foot out of the water. ... It was torn up real good."

He said another surfer helped him get to shore, where lifeguards got him to an ambulance. He was transferred to Shands after being examined at Baptist Medical Center-Beaches.

He said he didn't see what bit him, but believed it was a shark.

More than 300 stitches were needed to repair the damage, said Peter Schulz, the pitcher's father.

"He's doing great. The doctors at Shands have been outstanding," the father said.

Schulz, a left-handed pitcher for the Ospreys, is entering his junior year at UNF, his father said.

Official accounts of the injury weren't available this evening.

Lifeguard station staff referred questions to a supervisor who didn't immediately return a voicemail message. A police spokesman said he wasn't familiar with the incident.

It's at least the second biting injury reported in as many months at Jacksonville Beach.

Lifeguards cautioned people to watch for sharks after a woman in waist-deep water was bitten on the leg in early June. When that warning was issued, local officials stressed that other types of fish besides sharks can also cause bite injuries.

Reports of shark attacks are relatively rare in Jacksonville.

By last year, only 19 "unprovoked" attacks had been logged in Duval County since the 1880s, according to the International Shark Attack File, a project at the Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainesville. There had been 629 attacks recorded statewide, according to the file.


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