SHARK ATTACK: Sharks attack two teenagers in SHALLOW ocean water

North Carolina's Oak Island has experienced three shark attacks in the last month.

A North Carolina beach was rocked this weekend after sharks attacked two teenagers. With a time gap of a little over an hour, the two attacks left beachgoers stunned and scared for their safety.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - Both attacks occurred at Oak Island near the Ocean Crest Fishing Pier on Sunday, June 14, where the swimmers were only in waist-deep water. A similar attack occurred last week to a 13-year-old girl boogie boarding in the same area.

Sunday's shark attacks left a 12-year-girl, visiting from out of town, with part of her arm gone and in danger of losing her left leg and a 16-year-old boy with his left arm gone.

"I saw someone carry this girl (out of the water) and people were swarming around and trying to help," Steve Bouser, a witness, told The Associated Press, recalling people yelling to get out of the water. "It was quite terrible."

"It was so much like a scene from Jaws," Bouser's wife Brenda added.

According to Oak Island Mayor Betty Wallace, the shark attacks happened so close together, in time, that there was not enough time to get swimmers out of the water before the second attack.

"Our local police ATVs and the sheriff's boat and helicopter patrolled immediately after the second one, getting everyone out of the water," Wallace said in an e-mail to The Associated Press.

It is not known if the same shark attacked both teenagers.

"Oak Island is still a safe place," Oak Island town manager, Tim Holloman said, noting that Brunswick County's boat, Marine One, and helicopter, Air One, will be in the area, according to the Wilmington Star-News. "We're monitoring the situation. This is highly unusual."

According to George Burgess, director of the Florida Program for Shark Research at the University of Florida's Florida Museum of Natural History, the sharks typically found in the area are blacktip and spinner sharks, that reach about six to seven feet long. When sharks bite people, it is commonly a "mistaken identity situation," where the sharks believe the splashing human is its usual prey. With this area being next to a fishing pier, the bait in the water may have attracted the sharks.   

"You've got this nice beach scene going on, and the next moment is just a nightmare," Bouser told the Wilmington Star-News.

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