STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- A teenaged girl and her younger brother found a dead shark washed ashore on Midland Beach on Thursday.

Xochitl Noriega, 15, and her brother Ivan Noriega, 12, were walking the family dog along Midland Beach on Thursday afternoon when they stumbled on the shark's body on the beach.

"We just found it," said Miss Noriega, who found the shark near Miller Field. "It was just laying there, and we figured it was a tiger shark or something like that. It was dead, it wasn't moving."

"My brother, he was amazed," she added. "At first we thought it was a large animal, but as we got closer we realized it was a shark."

Miss Noreiga said while she wasn't sure what kind of shark it was, another passerby identified the fish as being a tiger shark.

Miss Noriega said she had never seen anything like that before; she and her brother walk the beach just about every day.

Miss Noriega said she and her brother returned to the spot later and the shark was still there.

"I'm nervous because this is just one shark, but you can't be sure. There could be more sharks out there," she said.