A photographer who survived getting his leg ripped off by a shark has captured footage of a new ultra-close encounter with one of the predators.
Mike Coots, 18, was boogie boarding in waters off Hawaii when a tiger shark grabbed him by his right leg and bit it clean off
Photographer who lost leg in tiger shark attack has close encounter with great white at Stewart Island
By Nelson Groom
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"It was like hanging with dinosaurs. It's one of the coolest things you can do on Earth. You can just feel the vibe from this apex predator.
"Stewart Island is one of the only spots in the world where you can consistently dive with big whites, but it's still quite rare to see them this close.
"Filming them actually calms me down. As a photographer I was just focusing on getting the shot and capturing the movement."
Coots' fascinating relationship with sharks changed forever the fateful day he was attacked.
The then-18-year-old was body-boarding off Kauai Island when a tiger shark latched onto his leg and started shaking it around "like a piece of meat".
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Coots's survival instincts kicked in and he hit the shark in its face until it released him – a whole 18 years before Mick Fanning would go viral for doing the same thing.
While paddling frantically back to shore, the then-teenager saw what he thought was the shark coming back to finish him off– only to realise it was his severed leg in the water.
Coots' friends dragged him up the beach and made a makeshift bandage and rushed him to hospital in a ute.
He had emergency amputation surgery and spent a week in hospital before undergoing two more weeks of recovery while he had his stitches taken out.
But Coots returned to the same beach straight afterwards – and went on to become an outspoken campaigner for saving the very animal that bit him.
The 38-year-old said: "I was just paddling for a nice wave when this tiger shark came up like a submarine and grabbed onto me and started shaking me around like a dog with meat.
"I gave it a couple of good punches on the nose then got back on the board. My hand was bloody but I managed to start paddling back into shore. Then my right leg started spasming.
"I saw something to the side which I thought was the shark. I looked over and it was my severed leg, I was just spurting blood out of the missing limb."
These days, Coots has shot to
for his incredible snaps of himself swimming with sharks while wearing a prosthetic leg.
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As an ambassador for
, he has become an outspoken campaigner on the subject – even speaking to the United Nations about the importance of shark sanctuaries.
Coots even developed a surfboard fin aimed at stopping shark culls by letting surfers pledge they do not wish for the shark to be killed in retaliation for surfers being killed or injured.
He said: "It's been a really fun experience to use my unique situation to connect with other people who are passionate about the same thing as me.
"Sharks aren't just man-eaters, they are invaluable to the balance and health of our oceans."
