The Whitsunday Islands are one of the most famous tourist destinations in Queensland, Australia for its serene picturesque beauty. It grabbed the global headlines now as a girl and a elderly woman was bitten by (what it was first believed to be a shark)a toadfish on Thursday while the pair had been wading in shallow waters at Catseye beach on Hamilton Island.
While One patient the girl suffered a foot injury due to a bite on het foot and transferred to Proserpine Hospital for further treatment though remains in stable condition, other patient the woman sustained a leg injury being trated at Hamilton Island Medical Centre. Neither of the injuries are life-threatening as said by Hamilton Island operators.
A Queensland ambulance spokesman twittered this incident.
Queensland ambulance
✔@QldAmbulance
#Whitsundays – Two shark bites have been reported in shallow beach water at a location off Resort Drive at 9:29am. Two patients are being treated at Hamilton Island Medical Centre. One patient sustained a foot injury and the second patient a leg injury.
Toadfish also known as ‘toadie’ in Australia is poisonous due to tetrodotoxin present in its body and eating this fish can have the fatal consequences. Gaguni is also a tharawal name for toadfish in the Sydney region.Toadfish got its name for its toad like appearance.Most of the toadfish can produce grunting or croaking sounds.
“Independent testing has suggested a fish was responsible in this instance, not a shark,” as said by local media.
In one such incident a man died of injuries in last November and a 12 year girl lost one of her legsafter mauling in September.
In 2009,Hamilton island gripped global headlines when around 34,000 people entered a competition to land the “Best Job in the World” – a six-month stint as “caretaker” of the idyllic destination.
Though Australia witnesses one of the world’s highest incidences of shark attacks in its seas, but fatalities remain rare.
