"My reaction was to try and get our friend out."
Two Ballina teenagers have been feted by the Queen’s rep in Australia and awarded bravery medals for intervening in a Great White attack on a mutual pal two years ago.
Jae Waters and Thomas Harper were fourteen and sixteen when they saw a Great White hit Cooper Allen, seventeen, at Lighthouse Beach.
“I was pretty close to him, probably ten metres away. We were just cruising,” Jae, left in the main photo, who became known around Ballina as “the kid with the mullet”, told the Sydney Morning Herald. “I thought he was messing around, like jumping off his board. Then I saw a bit more commotion and splashing around behind him. I saw the shark’s head behind Cooper at the start, then it swam between us. I didn’t look back but Tom did and said he saw the shark following us.”
This is how your favourite shark bounty hunter Fred Pawle reported the attack at the time:
As he lay on the sand surveying deep gashes to his leg after being attacked by a “massive” shark, 17-year-old Cooper Allen this morning made one heartfelt request: Don’t tell mum.
“He said, ‘you can call my dad, but don’t tell mum yet’,” said local surfer Dan Webber, who was in the water 5m away when the attack happened at Ballina, NSW and raised the alarm.
Mr Webber said Cooper, who lives across the road from the beach at North Wall and is one of the most regular teenagers in the water, was extremely lucky, and is likely to make a full recovery. He added that Cooper is an HSC student at one of the local schools.
“I’m no doctor, but I think he’s going to be fine,” Mr Webber said, still shaking from the experience.
There were four “huge” gashes in his leg about 5cm apart. “So the shark was a massive f**king thing,” he said.
Mr Webber was on his way out to join Cooper and his two mates when the attack happened. He was wading in waist-deep water when he saw a dark object in the water. What unfolded then was similar to what famously happened to pro surfer Mick Fanning last year, he said.
“His two mates swam up to him, and I joined them,” he said. “He’s just swimming backwards away from it. I think it (the shark) was tangled up in his legrope. I saw the dorsal and the tail fin thrashing around.
“He’s looked at me and said, ‘get someone to call an ambulance’. He was so calm and in control.”
Mr Webber screamed at two surf lifesavers who were erecting flags on the beach. He was surprised that the response was not urgent.
“Everyone was just standing around. It was like a whole minute of me screaming. But I was screaming for an ambulance. I should have screamed shark.”
Have you ever wondered how to kill a great white? Click here. (It ain’t that hard. But you must have the advantage of being on a boat.)
Have you ever wondered how to humanely rid an area of great white sharks? You can click here!
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Will the kid paddle out at the same spot straight away? Interesting to see where his surfing goes from here.
Kid with the Mullet: “So mate, since I saved you and all, you know the Bro Code says I get to date your sister?”
Kid with the Ballina Hickey: “My sister is 19 years old! She doesn’t date 14 year old kooks!”
Kid with the Mullet: ‘You’re right! She doesn’t date 14 year old kooks! She dates bravery medal awarded 14 year old heroes!”
Don’t call me mum!
Call the Sydney Morning Herald!
Mate.
I always thought that mullet were baitfish and now they’re a shark deterrent? In France I often spent hours surfing with schools of mullet supping on plankton on the surface at left hand rip bowls but get out of the water as soon as I see them in Oz . Good work done by kids and Mr Webber .
Yeah, plenty of mullets, but no sharks around here!
I used to touch the mullets on the head as I passed them in the rip. We had a few Basking Sharks liven up the line up over the years and have heard stories of Blue Sharks a few kms off the coast . Though I must say the delight ( absolute luxury )of surfing alone is somewhat dampened (in OZ ) when the fear of being eaten alive comes into the equation .
I’ve never been happy to lose my seat at the top of the food chain, I must admit… I surfed in Equatorial Africa where occasional sharks sightings were enough to get me out of the water.
Yes, I saw some sharks some ten or fifteen miles out in the ocean, straight west from Hossegor, but I”m quite sure they don’t usually come closer to the shore, not enough food and not enough water, I guess…
Saw?
Fact: Zero sharks.
Conclusion: Mullets repel sharks.
wish there was a word for the emotion one feels when remembering when shark attacks kept crowds at Ballina at minimal levels.
bittersweet ?
Schadenstalgia?
Sharks don’t have hands.
This one was probably just being friendly and joking around a bit.
The real question is how another person named Webber weaves himself into the media spotlight again.
Just go to the upper level at the Chinese restaurant and order shark fin soup. We can all do our part.
Do they still sell? Are they the fins of happy sharks (the nurse, for example) or bad eggs (Whites, tigers etc.)?
You can get anything you want in Chinatown. The illegal stuff is sold on the downlow so you need to have an in.
Active shooter right now you are he prime suspect given your handle. Although I suppose if the locals have stopped firing we need to find formerly active shooter
Hey surf people. Fuck, fucken sharks. You see one in the water, it’s war.