"He came into the house with blood spilling out of his arm and told me, 'Don't freak out, Mom'," Sherry Davis said about learning her son, Zack Davis, 16, had suffered the bite. "It was more shock than anything else."
Paramedics responded and took the teen, who attends Vero Beach High School, to Lawnwood Regional Medical Center & Heart Institute in Fort Pierce. Sherry Davis said doctors stitched up the wound Tuesday and released him Wednesday. It took 42 stitches to seal it up.
The shark bite happened about 5 p.m. Tuesday at Avalon State Park beach, not far from the Davis home in the 100 block of Ocean Estate Drive.
© Eric Hasert/TREASURE COAST NEWSPAPERSZack Davis describes his shark bite ordeal that occurred at about 5 p.m. Tuesday while at Avalon State Park beach
Over the last two years, Zack Davis has surfed, swam or fished nearly every day and never had a close encounter with a shark before Tuesday, Sherry Davis said.
The shark was about 5 feet long. Zack Davis said he was rolling into the end of a wave and dropped a few feet underwater. That's when the shark — possiblty a blacktip — chomped on his arm.
"I've seen sharks in the water every once in a while, but never like this," the teen said.
The shark immediately released Zack's arm after the bite, he said.
"The first thing I did was made sure not to panic," he said.
The teen used the cord to his surfboard around his arm above the wound to reduce blood loss. He then ran home, just a short distance away.
Zack was out with his twin brother, Zane Davis, and another friend.
Once he heals from the bite, he plans to surf again.
"I won't let this prevent me from going back in the water," he said.
Used his surfboard leash as tourniquet! Smart kid.
And I'll bet his father taught him this: "The first thing I did was made sure not to panic," Mine did. Indeed, I'm still around because of that good advice.
On top of that, I'll bet his dad's a surfer, too.
As my (veteran, but non-surfer) father used to say: "Someone who doesn't panic is someone good to have around when stuck in a foxhole."
R.C.