BATHERS on an Australian beach ignored a terrified young woman who shouted, “Shark!” because they thought that she was joking.

Sarah Kate Whiley’s screams for help came too late to save the 21-year-old, whose arms were bitten off during the weekend attack off Queensland. She was airlifted to hospital, but died from blood loss soon afterwards.

The attack happened at a spot with a similar name to Amity Island, the fictitious location for Jaws, the blockbuster film. Like the Hollywood version, beachgoers at Amity Point on North Stradbroke Island, near Brisbane, were initially slow to realise the seriousness of the situation.

“Nobody could believe what was happening at first,” one bather said. Seconds later, frantic bystanders waded out to help the critically injured woman.

“I went to get her arm and her arm wasn’t there,” Ungue Tofo, one of the rescuers, said. Others scrambled for towels to stem the bleeding.

Police said that up to three sharks may have been involved in the attack, given the horrific nature of the woman’s injuries.

Inspector Peter Harding said: “She went down under the water . . . after about five or six seconds the deceased came out of the water and screamed, ‘Shark!’ and of course people at the time thought she was joking until they saw the blood.”

Ms Whiley, who was holidaying in the area with a church group, was dragged ashore by two fishermen.

Her injuries were said to be so appalling that little could be done to save her. She was swimming in chest-deep water just off shore when the first shark attacked.

The shark death was the first at a beach protected by Queensland’s Shark Safety Programme since it began 44 years ago, Anna Bligh, the Acting Premier, said.

Ms Bligh ordered an investigation into the attack to assess the effectiveness of the programme, in which nets or drumlines — large baited hooks anchored to the seabed — were secured off 84 beaches, including Amity.

It was the first fatal shark attack in Australia this year and the third since last March, adding to fears that the rising population of the protected species could be adding to the danger faced by swimmers.

Fishermen said that they had seen a significant number of sharks in the area, most of them believed to be bull sharks.

“We’ve never seen anything like it before,” Miles Scott said. “The amount of sharks underneath our crabbing boat when we’re out would shock a lot of people. They’re very aggressive and they don’t care what they’re attacking — even the propellers on our outboards.”

Steve McKinnon, who runs a diving company on the island, said that the spot where the woman was attacked was a popular swimming area and close to a channel that attracted aggressive bull sharks and whalers. “They move through the channel and on the high tide they come up into shallow water looking for prey,” he said.

The beach at Amity Point was closed yesterday as police searched for the shark. But marine experts cautioned against conducting a vendetta. Andrew Fox, a shark expert, said that there was no practical reason for hunting them because it would be impossible to identify the one responsible.

Despite the perceived threat, there have only been about 60 human fatalities in the past half century. The average remains about one a year, figures from Taronga Zoo in Sydney show.

• A 7-year-old girl died from a jellyfish sting off the Queensland coast yesterday. The girl ran screaming from the water and collapsed on the beach in front of her parents at Umagico on the Cape York Peninsula. Tentacle marks across her chest and legs indicated that she had been stung by a box jellyfish. (AFP)

MORE DANGEROUS THAN JAWS

The bull shark is a potential culprit in the Matawan Creek attacks — thought to be the inspiration for Jaws — in New Jersey in 1916, in which 4 people were killed in 12 days

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