A Canadian tourist lost both her hands when she tried to take a picture with a 6-foot shark while swimming in Turks and Caicos and it bit her.
The 55-year-old woman was snorkeling off Providenciales, the main island in the archipelago, Feb. 7 when she tried to “engage with the animal from the shallows in an attempt to take photographs,” the Turks and Caicos Department of Environment and Coastal Resources said in a statement.
The woman was a few yards offshore when the beast clamped its jaws on her arms, officials told The Daily Telegraph.
The tourist’s horrified husband jumped in the water to try to scare the shark away.
The victim, who has not been publicly identified, had to have one arm amputated below the wrist and the other halfway up her forearm, according to the Herald. She was flown back to Canada for additional treatment.
Authorities have not determined the species of shark that bit her but said it appears to have been a bull shark.
The same day, two American tourists were attacked by a shark in the Bahamas.
The Turks and Caicos beach was shut down afterward but reopened Feb. 9.
There were a total of 88 shark attacks around the world last year — 24 of which were provoked by humans, according to the University of Florida’s International Shark Attack File, which tracks such data.
