A man has been bitten on the leg by a shark on the New South Wales north coast, which has led to the closure of the beach.

Forty-one-year-old Sam Edwardes was surfing at Belongil Beach near Byron Bay about 6.40am on Sunday when he was bitten on the leg.

He then returned to shore on his board and alerted other surfers before he was airlifted to Gold Coast University hospital in a serious but stable condition.

Edwardes, reportedly from Suffolk Park, paddled back to shore and alerted others on the beach. His flatmate, Dane Davidson, described what happened.

“We literally only just paddled out into the water. I was 15m, 20m behind him,” he told the ABC.

“Basically as soon as my mate got out the back he sat up on his board and it was instantly a shark smashed from underneath, came up from underneath and knocked him clean off his board.

“There was a lot of thrashing and splashing. He started screaming.”

Davidson said they paddled back to shore and it wasn’t until they were back on the beach that he realised his friend had “a big chunk taken out of his leg” and was bleeding heavily.

“Me and a random bloke on the beach jumped in and wrapped the leg ropes around his leg for a tourniquet because the bleeding was bad. Hopefully that prevented him from losing a lot of blood.”

The NSW Department of Primary Industries said on Sunday afternoon Edwardes had been bitten on the upper left thigh and was airlifted to Gold Coast Hospital suffering significant injuries.

A spokeswoman said DPI scientists believed the shark was a juvenile white shark.

“DPI shark scientists have spent considerable time this morning trying to determine the size of the shark but due to the nature of the damage to the board they have been unable to provide an estimate on the size of the shark,” a spokeswoman said.

She said the department’s shark incident response team had been deployed and DPI staff were working with NSW police and Surf Life Saving NSW. Beaches in the area were closed.

The spokeswoman said no tagged sharks were picked up by VR4G shark-listening stations at the time of the incident, nor had any had been sighted from helicopters conducting patrols.

“There have been no aerial shark sightings or detections of tagged sharks on listening stations on the north coast in recent days,” she said.

There are 35 smart drumlines on the NSW north coast but the department said they were not in use on Sunday due to rough conditions and large swells along the north coast.

Byron Bay council elected not to have a smart drumline trial, the spokeswoman said.

It’s not the first shark attack that has occurred in the Byron Bay area. In 2014 there was a fatal attack at nearby Clarkes Beach. In 2016, a surfer escaped with minor leg injuries after being bitten on a beach between Suffolk Park and Broken Head.

Byron Bay lifesaving duty officer Chris Samuels said shark sightings were “not uncommon” in the area.

“You always see a couple about, but an encounter like this is unusual.”

He said the beach would be closed for 24 hours as lifesavers patrol the area.

The shark attack was the second major ocean incident in the area over the weekend. On Sunday a search was continuing for a veteran lifeguard who went missing in dangerous surf at Lighthouse Beach at Ballina.

Police were told 69-year-old Raz Burtonwood went swimming on Saturday morning and had not been seen since.

Marine Rescue, NSW Ambulance, SES and the Westpac Life Saver Rescue Helicopter resumed their search at 8am on Sunday after Saturday’s search was suspended in the evening.

Burtonwood was in 2013 recognised for his 20 years of service as a lifeguard.

• Australian Associated Press contributed to this report







