Post-mortem of Monterey-area shark assault sufferer Erica Fox exhibits single crushing chew

An post-mortem report launched late Wednesday exhibits Erica Fox, a swimmer seen within the mouth of a shark close to Monterey in December, suffered a single crushing chew to her legs and torso.

The pressure of the chew, which left a semicircle of tooth wounds from Fox’s knees to her stomach, broke her pelvis in a number of locations, the report stated. She additionally had a gaping wound 10 inches lengthy and 5 inches broad from the facet of her proper hip to her stomach. A serious artery in her midsection had been lower open.

Fox, a 55-year-old triathlete, was reported lacking in December, after she didn’t return to shore with the swim group she co-founded, the Kelp Krawlers. She had been far forward of greater than a dozen swimmers returning to Lovers Point seaside in Pacific Grove.

The U.S. Coast Guard stated a driver at a cease signal on his method to work referred to as 911 to report seeing a shark burst from the water about 100 yards off Lovers Point with what he believed to be a human protruding from its mouth. The man stated the shark submerged and didn’t resurface. A second witness additionally reported seeing a shark breach the water in that space.

Fox’s physique was discovered six days later north of Santa Cruz close to Wilder Ranch State Park, on the shore.

The workplace of the Santa Cruz County Coroner decided Fox died from “sharp and blunt force injuries and submersion in water due to a shark attack,” in accordance with the post-mortem report.

Her wetsuit and swimsuit have been ripped open in areas equivalent to her wounds, the report stated.

The report didn’t reveal the width of the chew. Fox, 5-foot-7-inches tall, suffered deep accidents to her proper knee and each thighs, with the semicircular array of wounds persevering with to her left facet and chopping throughout to the precise facet of her stomach, the report stated.

Experts stated on the time of the assault that the rocky shoreline close to Lovers Point attracts sea lions, and seals frequent the waters offshore. Both are main prey for white sharks. Large white sharks, which may attain almost 21 ft in size, migrate from offshore within the Pacific to the coast in October to bulk up on seals and sea lions, sometimes remaining by way of January.

Chris Lowe, a professor of marine biology and director of the Shark Lab at California State University Long Beach, stated Thursday that he believes a big grownup nice white shark, probably about 16 ft lengthy, killed Fox.

As with most white shark fatalities, Lowe stated, it’s noteworthy there was just one chew.

“The only explanation we can come up with in cases like this is that the shark made a mistake,” he stated. “It mistook a person for a seal or a sea lion.”

He stated that authorities informed him after the assault that there was no proof of defensive wounds — bites or scrapes to Fox’s fingers.

“This was a big shark,” he stated. “I think she was probably knocked unconscious immediately. It was a horrible trauma.”

Lowe famous that the world off Lovers Point rapidly shifts from shallow to deep water.

“Sharks are looking up for seals, and they have some area to build up speed as they rush from below,” he stated.

Shark assaults are extraordinarily uncommon.

There have been 17 deadly shark assaults statewide in California since 1950, and 236 whole assaults, in accordance with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. Over the previous 76 years, probably the most incidents, 27, have occurred in San Diego County, adopted by San Mateo County with 22, Santa Barbara with 21, and Marin, Humboldt and Monterey with 19 every, and Santa Cruz County with 17.

“Think about how many people we see in the ocean all the time, yet there are very few bites,” Lowe stated. “If you look at the number of boating accidents, the number of people who drown in rip currents, the number of people who are hit by boats and die, those are far higher than we see from shark bites. People get freaked out by the fact that there is an animal out there that can cause them harm. But the chances of getting attacked are far less than 1 in a million.”

Fox’s dying marked the third shark-related incident at Lovers Point since June 2022, when one other Kelp Krawler, Steve Bruemmer, was bitten and significantly injured whereas swimming. Two months later, a paddleboarder and his canine have been thrown from their board however unharmed when a shark bit it from beneath in the identical space.

Before Fox, the final fatality from a shark assault within the Monterey Bay Area occurred six years in the past. On May 9, 2020, Ben Kelly, 26, was bitten by a 10-to-12-foot nice white shark roughly 100 yards offshore at Manresa State Beach about 4 miles south of Aptos in Santa Cruz County whereas he was browsing. Authorities stated the chew severed an artery in his leg. He was helped again to the seaside, however died a short while later.

Fox was a co-founder of the Kelp Krawlers swim membership that waded into the waters on the Lovers Point seaside each Sunday morning for a mile-long loop alongside the shoreline swimming among the many kelp and starfish.

She loved the open ocean a lot that informed her husband, Jean-Francois Vanreusal, “I’m a fish!” She competed within the Escape from Alcatraz swim 19 occasions and was usually on the rostrum receiving a medal, he stated in a December interview whereas she was nonetheless lacking.

She knew swimming within the wild was a danger, he stated, “but a minimal risk.”

“The only comfort I find is that Erica was every Sunday here, excited to go in the water,” Vanreusal stated. “She really passed in the place she loved.”

Lowe stated after the accident he spoke with members of the Kelp Krawlers and informed them that to reduce danger within the Lovers Point space, they might swim in shallower water, nearer to the seaside.

Members of the Kelp Krawlers weren’t instantly out there Thursday morning. In the wake of the assault, membership member Lisa Jensen informed this information group that the group’s senior swimmers, like Fox, consider themselves as swimming in sharks’ house.

“You are far more likely to die in a car accident or even a plane accident than in a shark attack,” Jensen stated on the time. “We love the ocean.”

Jensen described Fox as “an incredibly cheerful, bubbly, funny, joyful, kind human being,” who, as a swimmer, was “always out leading the pack.”

Check again on this growing story.