Mauricio Hoyos still remembers the pressure that the jaws of a female Galapagos shark, over 3m (10ft) in length, exerted on his skull.
The animal had lunged at him with astonishing speed, giving him barely enough time to duck his head in a last ditch effort to protect his jugular vein.
“When it closed its jaw, I felt the pressure of the bite, and then, after what I think was a second, it opened it again and it let me go,” Hoyos told BBC Mundo from his home in Baja California, Mexico, a little over month after surviving the incident.
Hoyos, a marine biologist with over 30 years of experience studying sharks in their natural habitat, was on a research trip in Costa Rica when he was attacked by the shark in September.
Less than two months on, and still bearing the scars from the attack on his face, he describes his recovery as “incredible” - and says he even hopes to encounter his assailant again.
I didn’t hear no bell.
he’s looking to bite back
a female Galapagos shark
(Oh-oh, here she comes) Watch out, boy, she’ll chew you up (Oh-oh, here she comes) She’s a maneater
Though sharks don’t really like us, we are too boney.
Oh yeah? Well I don’t like how needly their fishy bones are either!
I’ll find it, but I won’t kill it. Now, what about my dynamite?
Esteban was eaten!
“I wonder if it remembers me”
