A man in Australia managed a lucky escape from a great white shark after it brutally attacked him.
Great white shark attacks are often tales of tragedy, but sometimes there are incredible stories of daring escapes.
Calmness under pressure was demonstrated by survivor Allan Oppert, a prison guard who survived a grim shark attack in 2004 off the coast of Western Australia.
Allan believed the "annoyed" shark - around four to five metres in length - picked up on the scent of fish on his spear gun.
He told the Guardian: "These sharks are like dogs, in their gestures and in their behaviour. They hunch up their backs when they are annoyed, and she was annoyed. All of a sudden, she’s spun around."
Allan was diving at the time of the incident in a spot he and his friends regularly visited over the weekends. Using weights to descend lower into the ocean depths, he was suddenly rocked by the life-threatening teeth of the world's most feared shark.
He said: "I got about halfway to the bottom. [I thought,] ‘She’s going to attack from the back or she’s going to attack from the side.’ The funny thing is that I didn’t think about dying."
The lighting fast sank its rows of teeth into Allan's legs, cutting right through to the bone and causing him to worry it would snap both his legs off.
Luckily for Allan, his spear gun that may have attracted the shark in the first place, was placed across his thigh.
He said in the report of the incident at the time: "The shark couldn’t bite down any further because the shaft had probably lodged in its mouth or throat which appeared to cause a gag reflex."
His diving equipment also helped, as he clamped his own teeth on his breathing apparatus and soared back to the surface when he inflated a buoyancy vest when the shark released its grip.
The report also concludes that the attack was most likely a 'warning' bite as "the legs were not chosen to reduce the diver’s locomotion but because they were accessible and allowed the shark to get its message across".
Oppert was lucky to get away with scars and an incredible story to tell, but not everyone escaping from the endangered sea beast is always quite so lucky. Nine people were killed in 60 attacks in 2020 alone and there is an average of around seven deaths per year.
