Doctors on vacation rescue 15-year-old shark attack victim in Florida: ‘It was God’s will that everyone was there’
Two doctors are being praised after rushing to help a 15-year-old girl bitten by a shark along a Florida beach Friday.
Ryan Forbess and Mohammad Ali were riding boogie boards with their children when they noticed people panicking on the shore of Rosemary Beach in Walton County.
“We all started running out of the water,” Forbess told WKRG. “I grabbed my son. He grabbed his daughter, and then I looked over to the left as we were getting to the beach and I saw cloudy red water from the shark attack.”
The pair rushed to help 15-year-old Lulu Gribbin and her friend, McCray Gaust, 17. Gribbin suffered serious injuries to her upper leg and hand, while the other girl had only minor foot injuries, the outlet reported.
The girls had been waist deep in the water when the shark attacked them.
The doctors, trauma nurses and emergency medical technicians ran over to help. The group tied tourniquets on Gribbin’s hand and leg and put pressure on her wounds to try to get the bleeding to stop.
“When I looked down at her and saw the severity of the injury, I realized that anybody with any kind of medical knowledge needed to help,” said Ali.
The majority of the medical professionals working together didn’t know each other. Forbess, a family medicine doctor in Alabama, and Ali, an interventional radiologist in Mississippi, visit the area every year with their families.
Still, Forbess said he might as well have been working with the group of responders for years.
“It was amazing. Kind of… it was God’s will that everyone was there to help at the same time,” he said.
The pair spoke to the child’s family after she was admitted to the hospital and were told she’s expected to survive.
Gibbin’s mother, Ann Blair Gribbin, posted online as her daughter received care and detailed the trip.
“It was our first mother-daughter beach trip, and we were all incredibly excited. Our first two days were amazing on the beach being with friends and going to dinners,” the mom wrote.
She said the family was alking back to the beach when they heard calls of a shark spotting and tried to find her daughter. But, then was panic and the family started to run toward the beach.
“The beach was packed with people just looking. I came up on a group of people surrounding someone on the ground and looked down and it was Lulu who was there. Ellie found me and said Mom its Lulu. I saw her wounds on her leg and started to scream,” the mom wrote.
“She was lifeless her eyes closed mouth white and pale. The wound on her leg or all that was left of her leg was something out of a movie. I finally made it back to her and held her hand and she saw me, and I told her I was there,” Lulu’s mother wrote.
“Her eyes were open. I had no idea how long she had been there or what had happened. Almost immediately the beach truck was there and the EMT’s loaded her onto a board and put her back in the truck and wheeled her off, she was air lifted away.”
Gibbin’s mother detailed how her daughter lost her left hand in the attack and had part of her right leg amputated.
“I am not sure who noticed the shark first, but Lulu said it bit her hand and then her leg and then went for her other friend and got her foot. Lulu said a man grabbed her other arm and pulled her out and another younger boy helped him carry her to shore,” the mom wrote
“I am eternally grateful for the 3 surgeons and all the nursing staff and doctors here at this hospital who saved Lulu. I am grateful for the doctors and nurses on the beach that day. I am grateful for the EMT’s on the beach and the crew in the air. I am grateful for the individual who pulled her out of the water.”
It’s not known what type of shark attacked the girls.
About two hours before the incident, a 45-year-old woman was bitten by a shark near WaterSound beach, nearly two miles away from Rosemary Beach. The woman was flown to a trauma center with critical injuries on her midsection and arm. A part of her arm had to be amputated.
Walton County Sheriff’s Deputies spotted a 14-foot hammerhead shark close to the area of the attacks. They said the shark’s presence in the waters was not unusual.
“We want to reiterate that sharks are always present in the Gulf,” the sheriff’s office said in a written statement. “Swimmers and beachgoers should be cautious when swimming and stay aware of their surroundings.”
