Sea Creature's Bite Ruins Annapolis Woman's Hawaii Vacation

ANNAPOLIS, MD — An Annapolis woman floating off Waikiki Beach thought a shark had bitten her foot when she felt a couple of sharp chomps and saw blood streaming into the waters along the Hawaii tourist spot. "It hurt like hell," Kristen Porter, 51, said of the injury she suffered recently while in a floatie on vacation.

Porter was in about 5 feet of water off Kuhio Beach Park on July 29 when she felt something clamp onto her right foot. She was able to free herself, yelled for help and was helped to shore by her son and two strangers. She was carried to a nearby urgent-care facility, where the doctor recommended Porter get stitches and said she could have been attacked by a shark, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reports.

A lifeguard at the scene who initially bandaged Porter's foot disagreed, and said it was likely a giant eel, although bites by those marine animals are rare.

(For more news like this, find your local Patch here. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app; download the free Patch Android app here. And like Patch on Facebook!)

"I couldn't believe it, but I knew immediately that it was something bad, and it wasn't just like a fish nibble, so I pulled my foot into the air and there was blood everywhere," Porter told KHON TV.

Waikiki Aquarium director Andrew Rossiter said such a bite is rare by an eel, which is typically active at night and prefers rocky areas. Hawaii has five or six eel species that could inflict a bite like the one Porter suffered.

She remembered seeing sand and rocks nearby, but doesn't know if she was floating above rocks when she was bitten.

Rossiter, dive master Dr. Kalani Brady, and the experts at the International Shark File in Florida all told KHON that based on the photos Porter shared of her injury, the wound came from a giant eel. Eel attacks cause thin lines of gashes similar to the injuries Porter received, Brady said.

Hawai‘i Institute of Marine Biology researcher Kim Holland told the newspaper he's pretty sure a shark was not to blame because their bites leave a single line of marks, while the double row of marks on the top of Porter's foot could likely come from the jaw of an eel closing.

Regardless, Porter said she loves visiting Hawaii and plans to return. She figures the odds are in her favor. "There's no way I can be bitten twice, I think," she said.

Photo Credit: Moray eel photo by Andrey Nekrasov /Shutterstock