Treasure Coast fatal shark attack unsettles First Coast water enthusiasts

The deadly shark attack on a kite surfer off Stuart Beach last week has reverberated to the Jacksonville area and beyond as water enthusiasts are still coming to grips with the freak incident.
"It's creepy, it's scary," said Taylan Castner, shopkeeper at All Wet Sports on Beach Boulevard, Duval County's only kite surfing outlet store.
Castner said he'd never heard of a kite surfer getting bitten by a shark. He's heard of attacks on surfers, swimmers and scuba divers, but kite surfers usually speed across the water unless they wipe out.
"We're not meant to be there [in the ocean]. But I'm not surprised, you can wipe out and then in you're in the water," Castner said.
The attack happened Feb. 3 as 38-year-old Stephen Schafer was about a quarter-mile from shore where he was kite surfing alone, according to Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers. A lifeguard saw Schafer struggling in the water, used a paddle board to get to him, then found Schafer bleeding heavily in the water from shark bites to his upper right thigh, buttocks and right hand.
The lifeguard kept Schafer alive until he got back to the beach, but he died shortly after at a Martin County hospital. The Treasure Coast Medical Examiner's Office ruled that Schafer died from loss of blood.
George Burgess, service curator of the International Shark Attack File at the University of Florida, traveled to Stuart to witness the autopsy and to provide analysis to officials. He refuted early reports that a school of sharks attacked Schafer.
"Was there more than a single shark involved? No, there were two bites on the victim," Burgess said from his Gainesville office Friday, "one of which was severe and led to his fatality."
Burgess said it's likely that an indigenous Florida shark attacked Schafer, which means it was likely a bull, tiger, spinner, black tip or lemon shark. He said the shark was likely 8 to 9 feet long.
Most of those sharks frequent the Atlantic Ocean off Jacksonville, Burgess said, although there was a massive migration of sharks when Schafer was attacked. Burgess said such a migration of sharks usually doesn't happen until mid to late spring and he speculated waters off the Treasure Coast started warming early this year, causing the sharks to school early.
While water temperatures are in the 50s in North Florida, Burgess said the migration of sharks will continue north as the water warms. But that doesn't mean shark attacks are guaranteed here, he said.
"One will realize rather quickly that shark attack is a phenomenon and that fatal shark attacks are even more rare," Burgess said. "This is a very rare phenomenon. As in any activity, there are some do's and don'ts that reduce the risk."
Burgess said Schafer was kite surfing alone and far from the shore during twilight hours, increasing chances of being attacked.
Jacksonville Beach Ocean Rescue Capt. Thomas Wright said those elements are stressed to beachgoers all the time in public awareness campaigns.
"That's kind of one of the reasons we try to keep people in waist-deep water or less so we can get there and respond," Wright said. "That's a rare case and I've never heard anything like that happening before."
Wright said kite surfers frequent the waters off Jacksonville Beach but that his guards have never seen a problem.
"Whenever they're in the water, we try to keep an eye on them. It's common for them to fall down, but they get right back up again. They typically only do it when the wind's onshore," Wright said.
Wright advised Beaches ocean swimmers: "Don't go by yourself, especially when lifeguards are off duty." Also, he said, "Twilight and the early morning hours [are] feeding time [for sharks]. They're out there all the time, but dawn and dusk is feeding time."
Ironically, Schafer's death occurred the same week that shark experts instituted the new Shark Induced Trauma scale, used to determine the severity of an attack and the injuries caused. It's similar to a Richter Scale for measuring earthquakes, said Burgess.
"Unfortunately, the first attack we recorded on the SIT scale was Schafer, and that attack was a 5," the most severe; the mildest attack is a 1, said Burgess.
Castner said the attack will be talked about for a while but that he doesn't see it hindering the sport or having any lasting effects on the First Coast.
"If you're going to make that jump to go kite surfing, I think you're understanding there are risks involved," he said. But he said kite surfers probably are "not going to be deterred by one shark attack."