Aspen, COLO. (KDVR)-16-year-old Colorado girl participates her story after she fought sharks on a family vacation. I sat exclusively with Nicole Vierro from Fox31 to exchange her flexibility journey after the attacks.
“I will never expect to be attacked by a shark, but I am here,” said Annabel Carlson.
He did not attack one penny, but two, Carlson, 16, who resides in Asben, and was on a family vacation in Blaze in August 2025 when that happened.
“We really liked to travel as a family, and that was like our large and fun vacation in the summer,” Carlson said.
Three days after the trip, Carlson and her mother were 120 feet deep into the dark ocean, noting that her family loves to dive with each other and fell accredited.
“Maybe there were three or four sharks that we saw,” Carlson said. “We also saw some of the really wonderful fish.”
After their diving adventure at The Blue Hole, Carlson and her mother on board the boat returned to join Karlson’s siblings, who wanted to alternate to jump from the top of the deck.
“I decided to go first,” said Karlson. “When I jumped and hit the water, a shark came from the bottom of the boat and started biting my hand.”
The survival instincts kicked as Karlson Fox31 told that it had hit and pulled the shark about six times.
Carlson said: “So we were face to face and was biting my hand only at this point,” Carlson said. “The other diving group was still in the water where this was happening and threw a life ring. My hand was somewhat distorted, so I couldn’t really get it, but I did a ring with my arms. While they were withdrawing me, another shark came and took my right leg.”
Carlson said that people started throwing oxygen tanks in the shark to try to get them out so that they could return to the boat.
“When we realized that the boat itself, the first aid group, did not actually he had the appropriate medical equipment for life supply measures. So this man I am very grateful to, was a tourist in our diving group, gave me a championship.
Carlson said that she had to fight to stay aware for an hour and a half to an island by a helicopter and an emergency response to the hospital.
“It was like the most difficult thing that I had to do in my life was to stay awake, because I really did not realize that we were fascinating that the fall was unconscious and may not take it out,” Carlson said.
Once she settled, she spent a month at Miami Hospital for treatment. When she finally arrived at her home to Asben, she realized that something was wrong with her leg.
Carlson said: “The shark, when it was mine, was the sting from my ankle to the bottom of my knee. “For example, he took the whole body. I think the big wound gave the way to the infection.”
It was transferred to the Children’s Hospital in Colorado to treat a “million” fungal infection.
“We had to restore it for multiple surgeries because of this infection,” Dr. Julia Sanders, director of the children’s bone shock at the Children’s Hospital at Colorado, told Fox31. “Thus she returned her again again and again. But she has already returned to a siphon, she works. She is doing Pilates. It’s just an incredible child. She has returned to diving.
“I would just say that everything happens for some reason and will always get out of it,” Carlson said. “There will always be light at the end of the tunnel.”
Carlson also said that she had had about ten surgeries so far and another in one month.
It has great, sports and altruistic ambitions.
“One of my biggest goals is to be able to start an institution to donate first aid groups for boats, camps and people only they need because this is what saved my life,” Carlson said. “If I don’t get a capital, I will not be here today.”