Even after losing his right stilt to a Great White, there's no dampening this surfer's joy for life.
The word legend gets thrown around a little too liberally, particularly around here, and mostly from my fingers hitting the keys, but even the most complete thesaurus comes up blank when it comes to describing Australian surfer Kai Mckenzie.
A little recap for those who’ve swung in late.
Kai Mckenzie is a twenty-three shredder from Bonny Hills on NSW’s North Coast who was hit by a ten-foot Great White while surfing a break wall in Port Macquarie, yeah, same joint the one-time title contender Mick Campbell was from.
Kai belted the shark even after it took off his right leg, made it to shore alive, but barely, where an off-duty copy ripped off his dog’s lead to fashion a tourniquet thereby saving the kid’s life.
His leg was miraculously washed ashore shortly after the attack where it was packed on ice, chucked on the car ferry that takes you back across the Hastings River and rushed, complete with cop escort to Port Macquarie Base Hozzy in the hope it could be reattached.
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It couldn’t, but Kai Mckenzie ain’t weeping in bed and lamenting his misfortune.
In a post today, and surrounded by friends including fellow Rage teamrider Noa Deane and former Skegss bassist-singer Toby Cregan, he wrote:
Spot something missing ? Hahah, so good to have so many amazing people behind me I really appreciate it, love this crew so much thanks for coming yesterday and to all the donations fucking unreal love you guys the links in my bio if you’d like to donate.
Cregan wrote: Best hang I’ve had in a hospital that’s for sure. KMAC solid as a
For whatever reason, Great Whites have turned pretty little Port Macquarie into a place where you may wanna think twice before going for a shred.
Right now, there are fifteen Great Whites near or just offshore including, likely, the fish that took off Kai Mckenzie’s right leg.
Here’s the link for Kai’s GoFundMe.