Newspapers picked up the story today. Here it is.
http://www.local6.com/news/3632142/detail.html
Shark Attacks Fla. Man In Gulf Of Mexico
POSTED: 7:14 am EDT August 9, 2004
UPDATED: 7:27 am EDT August 9, 2004
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- A 47-year-old man said he was attacked by a shark, which bit a square-foot piece of flesh out of his back, while swimming in the Gulf of Mexico.
James Tiffee, a Navy SEAL, was in stable condition Monday at the VA Medical Center at Bay Pines. He underwent four hours of surgery on his back, which required skin grafs, and suffered bites to his buttocks, his left hand and the left side of his face.
Tiffee said he was swimming to visit friends in a yacht anchored Big Bayou on Friday evening when he was attacked.
"I felt the impact on my back and was lifted ever so slightly into the air -- I realized pretty quickly it had to be a shark," Tiffee said.
His friends on the yacht, David and Jane Santos, heard him screaming and rescued Tiffee in their dinghy. David Santos drove him to the VA Center while his wife held a compress on Tiffee's bleeding back.
The shark was about 4 feet long, the Santoses said.
"I was swimming at feeding time and was splashing my legs around," said Tiffee. "I couldn't have done anything (worse) but to have slit my wrists in the water."
Last year, there were 31 shark attacks in Florida, none of which were fatal, according to the International Shark Attack File at the Florida Museum of Natural History. Most of the attacks occur on the east coast of Florida, not the west, said George Burgess, director of the Florida Program for Shark Research.
