Two associates recounted the surprising second they each had been bitten by a shark whereas vacationing within the Bahamas, as they get well from their accidents again house in the US.
Rileigh Decker and Summer time Layman had jumped off their buddy’s boat in Bimini Bay collectively on Friday and had been swimming again when the assault occurred.
“We had been swimming to the ladder, and I sort of felt one thing nudge my leg,” Decker, 20, advised “Good Morning America” from her hospital mattress in Florida. “We saved swimming, after which I felt a tug on my leg. And I knew proper then and there that I used to be bit.”
Decker mentioned she had no energy in her leg and could not get herself again on the boat, so her buddy pulled her again up. Summer time, who has a medical background, then guided their buddy as he wrapped a towel round Decker’s leg and a rope above her knee for a tourniquet till first responders might arrive, they mentioned.
“It was very scary,” an emotional Decker mentioned. “The worry of like considering, you understand, you are gonna die within the second.”
The shark bit her tibia bone and Achilles tendon, she mentioned.
American Rileigh Decker, 20, was injured in a shark assault within the Bahamas on Friday, Feb. 7, 2025.
Rileigh Decker & Summer time Layman
Layman, 24, was additionally bitten on her foot, although did not understand it at first, she mentioned.
“We each had been panicking in that second,” Layman mentioned. “I did not understand I received bit till they began screaming that my foot was, like, shredded and there was simply blood all over the place.”
The 2 had been bitten by what they imagine was a bull shark.
They each had been initially handled at an area clinic earlier than being airlifted to New Windfall for additional medical consideration, the Royal Bahamas Police Drive mentioned. They returned to the U.S. on Saturday.
Decker has had two surgical procedures on her leg up to now, and can doubtless want a minimum of a 3rd, her household mentioned.
“All we are able to do now could be simply be very grateful that we’re nonetheless right here as a result of it might have ended very in another way,” she mentioned.
Layman mentioned there “might be a highway to restoration” for them.
“We’ll get by means of this collectively,” she mentioned.
Rileigh Decker, 20, left, and Summer time Lyman, 24, proper, had been airlifted to hospitals in Florida after they had been attacked by a shark whereas swimming in Bimini Bay, Bahamas, Friday, Feb. 7, 2025.
Rileigh Decker & Summer time Layman
The 2 associates additionally had been grateful for his or her family and friends who had been on the boat.
“In the event that they weren’t there, we would not be right here,” Decker mentioned. “I am simply very grateful for all of them.”
Shark assaults are exceedingly uncommon. There have been 47 unprovoked shark bites recorded world wide in 2024, in response to yearly analysis carried out by the Florida Museum of Pure Historical past’s Worldwide Shark Assault File.
In 2023, there was a lone, lethal shark assault within the Bahamas, in response to the report. In that incident, a 44-year-old girl from Massachusetts was killed by a shark whereas paddleboarding close to the again of the Sandals resort, in response to the Royal Bahamas Police Drive.