A man had a lucky escape when a shark bit a huge hole in the back of his kayak off the Australian coast.

Gavin Kleidon, 39, said he saw the swirl of the shark in the water after he was thrown into the sea.

He managed to make an emergency call to police, guiding them to his position by telling them where planes arriving at nearby Brisbane airport were turning in the sky above.

Mr Kleidon hung onto his damaged boat as it took on more water, spending another 40 minutes in the sea waiting to be rescued.

"Being in the water with it being around was my biggest fear," Mr Kleidon told Sunshine Coast Daily.


"If you get a bite you're probably going to bleed out in that sort of time.

"I was paddling along minding my own business, it was all good and next thing, 'bam', I was in the water."

Police recovered the remains of the 6.5 metre kayak, which was missing its stern section.

Mr Kleidon was uninjured "although quite shaken and glad to be out of the water," officers said.

The kayaker told how he was able to give details of his position, saying: "I said, 'that plane that just turned was right on top of me', so they were there pretty quick."

And the experience has not put him off.

"It's unfortunate that I was there and that the shark was there and that's how it ended up," he said.

"We've done that run many times and paddled in locations where there's probably bigger sharks and touch wood we've never had an incident, but unfortunately we have now."