KEY LARGO, Fla. — An 8-year-old boy was airlifted to a hospital Monday after he was bitten by a shark in the Florida Keys, deputies said.
The Monroe County Sheriff's Office said the incident occurred in Key Largo on the oceanside just before 3:30 p.m. while the boy was snorkeling.
A medical helicopter airlifted the injured child to Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami.
The sheriff's office said the U.S. Coast Guard and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) were notified of the incident.
The boy was with his father and a sibling off a reef at the time, WPLG-TV reported, citing authorities.
The child's name and condition were not immediately released. But the child, who suffered bite wounds to the left leg, was taken to shore by a snorkeling and diving charter service's vessel, and then airlifted to a Miami hospital "for specialized trauma treatment and advanced medical care," the Key Largo Fire Department said in a release.
"A witness on scene, dad, said significant amount of blood loss," an emergency responder can be heard saying on dispatch audio posted on the Broadcastify website. "The injury is significant. Patient is pale."
The person on the charter service vessel who took the boy to medical personnel on shore — a roughly 20-minute journey — was a "good Samaritan," the fire department said without elaborating.
"We commend their quick actions in helping to transport the victim to our emergency responders," the department said.
CNN has sought more information from the charter service and contacted the hospital for an update on the boy's condition.
The shark is believed to be a reef shark, and its length is unknown, the fire department said.
While Florida leads the U.S. in unprovoked shark attacks, they are relatively uncommon in Monroe County, which had 21 recorded from 1882 to 2021 against more than 900 statewide in the same time frame, according to the Florida Museum of Natural History’s International Shark Attack File.
Last year, the U.S. had 28 unprovoked shark attacks, 14 of which were in Florida, according to the group.
Shark activity is at its peak in Florida waters from April through October, according to the FWC website. The agency says "bites still remain very rare."
