POSTED: 7:03 am EDT October 19, 2006
LIGHTHOUSE POINT, Fla. -- A Florida man is fighting for his life after a stingray jumped onto his boat and stabbed him in the chest.
A professor of marine biology at the University of Miami said such attacks are so "extraordinarily rare" that she's never heard of one like it.
The victim is an 81-year-old man who was boating with his adult granddaughter and one of her friends. The women were able to steer the boat back to land and call for help.
Rescuers said surgeons were able to remove some of the foot-long barb but not all of it. Open-heart surgery may be necessary.
The roughly five-foot wide, 30-pound stingray died on the boat.
While such incidents are said to be rare, TV's "Crocodile Hunter" Steve Irwin was fatally stabbed by a stingray while swimming with them in Australia last month.
http://www.wsbtv.com/news/10110120/detail.html
LIGHTHOUSE POINT, Fla. -- A Florida man is fighting for his life after a stingray jumped onto his boat and stabbed him in the chest.
A professor of marine biology at the University of Miami said such attacks are so "extraordinarily rare" that she's never heard of one like it.
The victim is an 81-year-old man who was boating with his adult granddaughter and one of her friends. The women were able to steer the boat back to land and call for help.
Rescuers said surgeons were able to remove some of the foot-long barb but not all of it. Open-heart surgery may be necessary.
The roughly five-foot wide, 30-pound stingray died on the boat.
While such incidents are said to be rare, TV's "Crocodile Hunter" Steve Irwin was fatally stabbed by a stingray while swimming with them in Australia last month.
http://www.wsbtv.com/news/10110120/detail.html