Terrifying moment swimmer, 30, is mauled by SHARK as she filmed her snorkelling trip in the Maldives
A LUXURY Maldives getaway turned into a nightmare when a dentist was mauled by a shark in a terrifying attack.
Ekaterina Alexandrova, 30, from Moscow, shared the horror moment she was attacked while snorkelling with a friend.
While on a trip that she was told was “safe”, Ekaterina suddenly felt “insane pain”.
The chilling video shows the moment that she escaped death by shark attack.
“I got lucky – I pushed [the attacking shark] away with my left hand, and it didn’t manage to bite hard,” she said.
She was able to make it back to her tour boat after being bitten by a normally docile shark.
Her friend Masha “turned pale and almost fainted – the boat was covered in blood,” she said.
She posted a video in which she told the story of her horror shark attack.
“I was bitten by a shark in the Maldives.
“I feel problems ahead because a lot of stingrays arrived.
“The number of sharks grew three times bigger than at the start of the dive.
“The depth is shallow, there are a lot of sharks and there is nowhere to escape.
“The next was the moment I was bitten.
“I keep an eye on a predator as I snorkel.
“I turn my camera away from myself, and just then the shark sharply turns [at me].
“All I could do was to push the shark away with my left hand.
“The camera falls out of my hands and lands on the sea bottom, the depth is about [8 to 10ft].
“My camera even hits another shark on its tail.
“I don’t panic, because it’s not allowed to splash about in the presence of predators.”
She posted later: “I’m not exaggerating or joking.
“This is the reality of a holiday I ended up on.
“Honestly, breaking my leg didn’t hurt as much as what happened to me in [the Maldives].
“Thank you to my friend who was with me the whole time.
“It all happened like in a bad dream.”
She then described her experience at the hospital.
There, Ekaterina was filmed shaking from shock as she was given stitches for the gash in her skin.
“They cut something, stitched something.
“The bone and ligaments are intact – that’s great.”
Discussing the video from the hospital, she said: “Just so you understand – I was in shock and just smiling stupidly.
“The pain, of course, was insane. I cried later.”
The dentist revealed that she plans on returning to work soon.
She claimed that at the hospital staff told her “there were three fatal stingray attacks this March.”
Nurse sharks, although not typically aggressive, can become defensive if threatened.
Despite the rarity of shark attacks, the Maldives has seen occasional incidents, with most attacks being minor and not life-threatening.
It comes as a massive basing shark was accidentally caught by fisherman in Spain.
The 22ft beast was hauled out of the water in the country’s north-eastern Catalonia region.
A video showing the heart-stopping moment it reached dry land has been shared widely on social media.
The clip, seen more than 150,000 times on X, shows onlookers crowded around the vast creature as it is brought to shore.
What appears to be a fishing net can be seen tangled around the shark’s tail fins.