Former LIer talks about his own shark attack

On Aug. 4, 2001, Krishna Thompson got up early and headed to the beach for a morning dip in the Caribbean waters at the Bahamas resort where he and his wife Ave Marie were celebrating their 10 years of marriage.

The couple had arrived the day before, and the crystal waters beckoned. "It was beautiful," said Thompson, who grew up in Westbury and lived in Central Islip at the time.

Suddenly, as he was treading water, he saw a dark fin approach, Thompson said. He tried to lunge away, but "I felt it graze my left thigh" as the shark passed between his legs. Thompson felt the jaws closing around his left calf. "I can remember its teeth just crunching on me," he said. "I couldn't believe it."

The shark began towing Thompson away from shore to open water, and he was worried that yelling for help would allow water into his lungs and drown him. So he had to free himself first. "I threw one punch," Thompson said, pumping his right fist into the air to demonstrate. "Then I took both my hands and opened his jaws and I tried to get my leg out."

The audacious move worked, much to Thompson's surprise - he said he didn't even have to use much force to open the shark's mouth.

"I was so happy I was free," he said. The shark, dazed by the blows, swam away, Thompson said.

He credits his ability to swim back to shore with a mangled leg while losing massive amounts of blood, to his focus on finishing the task ahead of him. "I just took my time. I was really relaxed because I knew I had to do this," Thompson said.

He collapsed on the beach, and as bystanders rushed to his aid, he scrawled his hotel room number in the sand so that his wife could be notified.