VERO BEACH — The Vero Beach Police Department has released the initial 911 call to dispatchers reporting the shark attack of a German visitor near the Driftwood Inn on Wednesday.
The call, which lasted nearly 3 minutes and 20 seconds, was from a woman who told dispatchers that a woman was pulled from the water with injuries.
“It had to be a shark,” the caller said.
Dispatchers asked if anyone on scene had towels and were applying pressure to the wound. The caller said that both were indeed happening.
Emergency operators fielded another six calls in the minutes following the attack, according to the Vero Beach Police Department.
To listen to the 911 call, click on the Audio file next to this article.
UPDATE: Shark attack victim in critical, stable condition
Originally reported 9:41 a.m.
VERO BEACH — The German tourist bitten in the leg by a shark off Humiston Beach Wednesday is in critical but stable condition, authorities said Thursday. The status of her leg, which a witness said sustained massive injury, was not known.
Karin Ulrike Stei, 47, of Konstanz, Germany, was swimming in waist-deep water around 11:30 a.m. not far from the Driftwood Inn when she was attacked. She had been swimming with a friend, also of Germany.
The type of shark that attacked Stei is not yet known.
Stei remains at Lawnwood Regional Medical Center.
