A 40-year-old person has died after being attacked by a fish on the top of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, regional authorities said.
Luke Walford, a junior priest, had been spearfishing with his family when he was bitten on Saturday evening.
He sustained “life-threatening accidents” and despite doctors ‘ work, he died at the scene about an hour after, officials said.
When the invasion occurred, he and his family were in the ocean at Humpy Island in the Great Barrier Reef’s Keppel Bay Islands National Park. The place is a popular location for diving and snorkelling.
Walford had been a college priest and priest at the Cathedral of Praise religion in Rockhampton, Queensland.
Donna Kirkland, his native MP, said she was in horror, and that Walford was a friend to her and” many people”.
” My blessings and heartfelt condolences are with his beautiful home and indeed the some who will be devastated, as I am, at this reports”, she added.
A colleague of a family member claimed to have witnessed the rescue helicopter fly over his home without realizing it was for him.
” I often say a small gift for whoever it may be, but to find out it was Luke was a very terrible day,” Doug Webber said.
According to Queensland authorities, a report may be prepared for the coroner.
Australia’s last fatal shark attack happened in December 2023, when a teenage boy was killed in the south.
Only this year, there have been four different animal incidents in Australia, according to a nearby database.
Australia is the only nation that has seen more animal problems overall than any other nation, aside from the US.