‘It’s quite a savage bite’

A surfer is lucky to be alive after a terrifying encounter with a massive great white shark off the coast of New South Wales left his surfboard in two pieces — and fellow beachgoers in shock.

Brad Ross was surfing at unpatrolled Cabarita Beach around 7:30 a.m. on Monday, August 18, when the 16-foot shark struck, taking a massive bite out of his board, launching him in the air, Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported.

Miraculously, Ross escaped without a scratch.

“The man was sitting on his board and the shark literally bit the board behind his butt,” said local yoga teacher Kym Falvey, who witnessed the incident.

“The board just popped, like it exploded … It flew up in the air, and there was a man up on the rocks yelling, ‘Oi, come in!’”

In a dramatic video shared online, Ross was seen scrambling to shore with his now-destroyed board, visibly shaken but physically unharmed. The surfboard, split in two, was missing a large, bite-shaped chunk of foam — a mark officials later confirmed came from a great white.

“It’s quite a savage bite and large,” said Dave Rope from Surf Life Saving Far North Coast. He insisted Ross is “very, very lucky,” adding, “I’d be buying a lottery ticket if I were him.”

The attack triggered an immediate response from Surf Life Saving NSW, police, and the Department of Primary Industries.

Lifeguards closed Cabarita Beach and nearby Norries Cove, posted warning signs, and deployed drones to monitor the area.

According to the NSW government’s SharkSmart App, a 16-foot great white was caught and released from a SMART drumline — fishing gear used to lure and capture large sharks typically deployed near popular swimming areas — off the same beach just hours after the incident.

Two more lines were added as a precaution.

Kane Douglas, a friend of Ross who was paddling nearby, said the attack happened in an instant. “The board exploded, one half went that way, the other half went that way, there was just whitewash and debris everywhere,” he recalled.

Ross, though visibly stunned, remained surprisingly composed afterward. “He was more upset about the board,” said surfboard maker Jason Jamesson, who shaped the damaged board.

“That board was glassed heavier than normal boards … it was a strong, heavy board and it just crushed through that in one chomp,” he said, adding that the strength of the bite is “hard to comprehend.”

The attack occurred in the same spot where a 16-year-old boy was seriously injured by a shark just two months ago, sparking renewed concerns about shark activity in the area during whale migration season.

According to the University of Florida’s International Shark Attack File, there were 47 confirmed incidents of unprovoked shark bites in 2024, with 28 of those happening at U.S. beaches.

Just last week, a great white shark was spotted multiple times off the coastline of Scarborough, Maine.