'Like fighting a dinosaur': Sydney woman recalls how she punched shark during attack
Leah Stewart, 34, was mauled by a great white shark in June during a morning swim at Coogee Beach.
A Sydney woman, Leah Stewart, has recounted the terrifying moment she confronted a four-meter great white shark during an attack at Coogee Beach in June, describing the struggle as "like fighting a dinosaur" as she repeatedly punched the animal.
Stewart, 34, was dragged underwater by the shark, which bit her thigh and arms, leading to severe blood loss and injuries that necessitated the amputation of her left arm.
In an interview broadcast on Sunday, the mother-of-one explained her determination to survive for her baby daughter. "In my head, I was like, ... 'You are not taking me away from my daughter', and I twisted myself around and I just started punching it over and over and over again - it was like fighting a dinosaur," she stated.
Just moments before the attack, Stewart had completed her usual Saturday morning swim and was heading to shore when she was alerted to danger. "I heard a girl behind me… a shrill shriek. I turned and there was a huge, huge fin behind her. It was massive," she told Nine Network's 60 Minutes. "I looked at the size of it and I realised that's not a dolphin."
Stewart then turned to see the shark "right there … and it just was getting closer and closer and closer." She described the shark's face as "horrific," with "black little beady eyes" and "its teeth and its mouth was massive."
"We were looking face-to-face," Stewart recalled, noting that at one point, the shark was merely 30cm from her. Even in that intense moment, Stewart maintained a calm demeanor. "I'm right-handed, so I thought 'let's do a left hook'," she said. "I just kind of throw my left arm and it just grabs onto my forearm and rips, rips away my skin, my muscle, everything... there's a big gap between my forearm and the hand."
As the shark began to pull her underwater, grabbing her leg, Stewart initially thought, "this is it, this is how I die." However, the thought of her daughter, August, spurred her on. "Then I just thought of [my daughter] August and I thought she's not going to have a mum, she's gonna grow up without a mum," she said, fighting back tears. "I just knew I couldn't leave her... I know it sounds strange but I sort of willed myself back."
She described punching the shark as "like punching a brick wall" but persisted. "I must have got a really good one in and so it let me go. It was the hardest thing in the world, but I fought my way out of there."
Other swimmers pulled Stewart to shore, and she was then rushed to the hospital, where she was placed in an induced coma and underwent nearly a dozen surgeries.
Despite the harrowing ordeal, Stewart expressed that she does not wish to be remembered as "a girl that got mauled on the beach." Instead, she declared, "I'm the woman that punched the shark in the face."