Spring break wasn’t all fun and games for Oregon fourth grader Henry Kreckman. The youngster returned to school at Netherwood Knoll Elementary with a wound on his chest and the perfect story for how he spent his vacation—getting bit by a shark.
Henry’s parents, Clint and Sara, described the strange encounter with a nurse shark in the waters off a resort where the family was vacationing in the Bahamas, according to the Wisconsin State Journal.
“It was clamped onto his chest,” said Clint of the 2.5 foot long nurse shark.
Henry, age 9, was on the beach with his mother, brother Jack and two other friends when they saw the nurse shark in shallow water. The family was content to leave the shark undisturbed, but an unidentified man intervened. He took the shark out of the water by the end of it’s tail and welcomed the boys to “pet the shark.” Although the boys refused, the man lost control of the shark and it latched itself to Henry’s chest.
“I heard Henry screaming ‘get it off me, get it off me,’ I stand up and my friend goes running up the beach yelling ‘shark bite’ and I go running into the water,” Sara said. The man brought her bleeding son to the beach after removing the nurse shark from his chest.
Luckily, Sara is a pediatrician and was able to treat her son immediately. She described the injury as “a triangle bruise the size of a tennis ball” with “puncture wounds at the top and bottom.” Henry’s shirt also suffered damage, with a perfect hole left in the center. Sara, prepared for emergencies, had a supply of First Aide items and acknowledged that the injury looked worse than it was.
The man who provoked the shark disappeared, but was described by Sara as being in his late 20s. His identity remains unknown, and although he likely wasn’t attempting to hurt anyone, the Kreckman family is lucky Henry walked away with nothing more than a bruise.
These sorts of attacks do nothing to improve the reputation of sharks, who are assumed to be vicious predators just waiting to attack innocent humans. Nurse sharks in particular are gentle, slow-moving bottom dwellers, not commonly associated with attacking humans. Although they have strong jaws, they are generally harmless to swimmers. But like any animal, if they are provoked or threatened by people in their environment (or lifting them out of their environment) they can become defensive. Fortunately, this specimen was on the smaller side, as Nurse sharks can grow up to 14 feet. A larger shark could’ve done permanent damage.
It’s important to remember that no wildlife should be considered docile or tampered with. These creatures are here for us to observe, appreciate, and study from afar, and the animals cannot be blamed for following their instincts. Sadly, in most cases it’s the animal who suffers worse than meddling humans, as often they are killed or grievously injured at the hands of intruders to their environment. Please be sure not to handle ANY sharks you see in the wild and if you see anyone behaving irresponsibly, notify the nearest professional or confront them politely.
