Man drags shark onto beach in front of stunned beachgoers before horror attack

A man who was trying to drag a sharkback out to sea in front of stunned beachgoers was bittenby the grey and white creaturewhile wrestling with it in the water.

The 21-year-old man had caught the Sandbar shark while fishing but ended up needing to be evacuated by an air ambulance for treatment. The fisherman, who has not been named, caught and tried to release the animal on the beach near Hoicks Hollow in Nantucket - an island in Massachusetts, USA - on Sunday night. In video footage of the incident he can be seen dragging the animal into the water by its tail, as the shark begins squirming from side to side.

At one point the man then jumps across the shark, leaning down on it, while opening its mouth up to look inside with two other men, while families including young children watched on. It appears that the group of men are removing a fishing hook from the shark's powerful jaws, in order to release the predator back into the ocean.

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The barefooted man then drags the shark into deeper water, and with the help of two others, appears to try to release it, while still holding on to its tail as the waves go back out. Once the man is waist-deep and let's go, the shark promptly turns and bites him on the leg, before swimming off.

The man is then seen hobbling to the shore, he hops at one point and needs one of the other men to help him reach the safety of the sand. First responders were not called to the scene, and the man was driven to the hospital by a friend.

He was later transported by a Boston Medflight helicopter to a mainland hospital to be treated for his injuries. The entire incident was witnessed by numerous beachgoers and people at the nearby Sankaty Head Beach Club.

According to Nantucket Current's instagram post Massachusetts shark biologist John Chisholm, of the Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life, identified the shark that bit the man as a sandbar shark, a common species in the waters around the area.

It comes after sevearl great white sharks have been spotted off the coast of nearby Cape Cod already this month, according to the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy. The rise in the number of shark sightings coincides with the warmer weather, which sees locals and visitors flock to the picturesque beaches.

"The sharks and the humans are both on the water's edge more frequently in the summer," explains Dr Nick Whitney, senior scientists at the New England Aquarium. Shark sightings are recorded on the conservancy's Shaktivity app, which notes confirmed as well as unconfirmed sightings with pins for individual spottings, as well as shark tag detections. The app also notifies users when a shark sighting is confirmed close to a public beach.