17-year-old shark bite victim plans to be 'same old Paigey' despite injuries

A North Carolina teen who was attacked by a shark two weeks ago says she doesn't plan to let her injuries get in the way of living her life.

Paige Winter, 17, had her left leg amputated above the knee and suffered extensive injuries to her hands following the June 2 attack near Fort Macon State Park. She will likely be released next week from Vidant Medical Center in Greenville, where surgeons, her nurse and her father discussed the incident and her recovery during a Friday afternoon news conference.

Charlie Winter, her father, recounted the attack in harrowing detail, describing how a fun day at the beach with the family suddenly turned tragic and, if not for a precise chain of events, could have become deadly.

Paige was among a group of teens and children playing in waist-deep water, and Winter said he ran out to try to scare them. Moments later, he saw that his daughter was missing and that the water looked pink, he said, so he dove under at the site, grabbed her with his left arm as she was being pulled backward and lifted her out of the water.

"It was just an immediate dad thing," he said of diving in. "When I pulled her up, a shark came up with her, and it was a big shark. The head was, it was a big shark. It kind of thrashed a little bit, and it had a big, just a big eye staring at you."

Winter said he beat the shark repeatedly "with everything I could" while holding on to Paige, and the shark finally let go. He said he could see her leg was seriously injured, so he used his training as a paramedic and squeezed her thigh as tightly as possible to stanch the bleeding as he ran with her back to the beach.

"The shark was at arm's length behind me, chasing us. I didn't know that until later. I also didn't know that there were two sharks out there," he said. "I've been told [the shark] was the length of a car. I don't know, I didn't see it. All I saw was its head, and it was impressive."

During the attack, he said, his 15-year-old daughter grabbed a 7-year-old boy and pushed him toward the shore and away from the shark.

Paige never screamed or cried at any point during the ordeal, he said, describing her as "completely calm." She merely said, "Dad" every few seconds, he said, to which he replied, "I got you. I got you."

When Winter was about 10 feet from the shore, he said, other people rushed in to start helping, carrying her to the beach, offering towels and calling for help. A man walking by even gave up his belt for a tourniquet, he said.

"Names I don't know. Names I'll never know. Just a link in a chain," he said, his voice cracking. "It's very odd that every single thing that had to happen when it had to happen happened. I don't know why it happened, but it happened, and she's here."

Winter said he was no longer a paramedic at this point but was merely a father trying to squeeze as much as possible out of what he feared were his final minutes with his oldest daughter.

"I grabbed her by her right hand, and I don't think I've ever told any of my children I loved them so much so many times. I wanted her to know," he said. "I listened to every word she said, every movement of her lip, every way the wind blew her hair. I just took it all in."

As an ambulance rushed Paige and Winter to Carteret Health Care in Morehead City to be airlifted to Vidant, Winter said, Paige uttered what has become her mantra since the attack: "Don't be mad. Sharks are good people."

Winter had that phrase on the back of a T-shirt he wore to the news conference that had an image of a girl and a shark shaking hands on the front and a silhouette of a shark on the back with "Paige - 1, Shark - 0" on it.

Paige didn't attend the news conference, but Vidant officials videotaped a statement from her.

"I want people to know that I'm doing all right and to know I'm still going to be able to do all the stuff that they can do," she said. "I'm going to be able to do just kind of like everything, just same old Paigey."

She said she was grateful for the support of other shark bite victims and amputees and said she plans to turn a tragic situation into a positive.

"When I was in that water, I was praying, 'I'm 17 years old, and I've got so much to do,'" she said. "Seventeen-year-old lost a leg, and we're popping. I think I can transform this into something good for me and good for sharks and good for the environment."

"Sharks are still good people, and that's just kind of the truth," she said. "They're still so good, and they're so cool. They're pretty cool, good people."

Winter and Paige's surgeons and nurse marveled at the teen's positive attitude and determination following what trauma surgeon Dr. Eric Toschlog called a "devastating injury" to her leg.

"She puts a smile on my face every single time I walk in the room," nurse Brianna Springer said, adding that she learned from Paige how to give herself pep talks after hard days.

Dr. Richard Zeri, a plastic surgeon who helped rebuild Paige's hands through a series of surgeries, opened the news conference by forwarding a message from Paige to "Ironman" actor Robert Downey Jr. that she wanted him to follow her on Instagram.

"She's quite a young lady," Zeri said.

In addition to her left leg, Paige lost the ring finger and pinkie on her left hand, and Zeri had to transplant tissue onto the hand to restore some of what was lost.

Winter said the hand injuries came from the shark's teeth as Paige tried to wrench the creature's mouth open after she was bitten.

"Those teeth are very, very sharp. It looks like there was a knife was taken to [her hands]," Zeri said, noting her tendons, nerves and other tissue were shredded.

Vidant surgeons see two to three shark attack victims a year, but Toschlog said he's never seen injuries as severe as Paige's. Based on the circumstances of the incident, he said, he suspects it was a bull shark that attacked her.

Despite the attack, Toschlog and Winter said people should live their lives and not be afraid to go to the beach and play in the water if that's what they want to do. The chance of dying from a shark attack is one in 1.37 million, compared with one in 84 for dying in a car crash, Toschlog said.

"These are extraordinarily rare events," he said, noting only four shark-related deaths were recorded worldwide last year. "I would advise: Get in the water."

"You've got to live your life. Paige is," Winter said.

Paige is expected to be released from Vidant next week, Toschlog said, but will spend a couple of weeks in a rehabilitation facility to get fitted for a prosthetic leg and to begin to learn to walk with it before heading home. Zeri said getting function back in her hands will take six to 12 months of therapy.

Winter said he can't wait to get his daughter home so she can get on with her life.

"Paige is destined for great things, and she's going to do great things," he said. "I don't know what her future holds. ... I do know it's extremely bright, and it has to be bright because someone like that, it's the only thing it can be."