



Andrew Cotton has been injured after a horror wipeout at Nazare earlier today, suffering an injury to his back.

Cotty's credited with having surfed the biggest wave on the planet at Praia do Norte, needless to say the man knows what it's like to feel the grunt of a brutal take down.

Probably the heaviest wipeout I have ever caught on camera. You're a legend @andrew_cotty #nazare #wipeout #wsl #xxl #heavy A post shared by dids. (@go_dids) on Nov 8, 2017 at 8:25am PST

But there's something in this footage that makes it one of the most gnarly wipeouts seen at Nazare. Cotty gets detonated and thrown up, then down the face of a gruelling, Atlantic bomb.

This was captured while a crew was shooting a new documentary about Garrett McNamara's return to big wave surfing. Posting to Insty, Gmac said: “Andrew got hurt on this wave today, so everybody let’s focus on a speedy speedy recovery he says he’s fine just a little back injury nothing serious but we want to get that boy back in the water, so please everybody manifest focus and see him back in action in record time.”

Also taking to Insty, Cotty posted a little update from his hospital bed. “Thanks to everyone who helped this morning,” he said. “Everyone was really calm, you guys really saved my back, which unfortunately is broken but definitely could be worse, so thank you.”

Here's hoping for a speedy recovery for one of Nazare's hardest chargers.

Cover shot: Helio Antonio