NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- There's an adage in motorcycle riding that "it's not if, but when" you're going to crash. Well, the same came be said of surfers who challenge the sharks off the south for the primo waves.
Just ask 55-year-old Jimmy Johnston of New Smyrna Beach who has been surfing here since he was 10.
Johnston became Volusia County's second shark-bite victim of the year Saturday while sitting on his surfboard when a spinner shark snapped onto his right foot instead of a bait fish that jumped out of the water near him, a spokesman with the Beach Patrol said.
Johnston suffered an elongated bite from jerking his foot out of the shark's mouth instead of waiting a second or two for the shark to release its bite, Beach Patrol Capt. Scott Petersohn said.
Johnston was driven to nearby Bert Fish Medical Center by a friend for stitches after telling a Beach Patrol officer this was his first time being bitten in 45 years of surfing here.
taken to Bert Fish Medical Center in New Smyrna Beach by personal vehicle.
A 10-year-old Orlando girl was bitten by a shark on May 1 while playing in waist-deep water near 20th Avenue, and after being bandaged up by a paramedic after the "clamp-down" bite, insisted on going back in the water, which she did.