Overview

• Annabelle Carlson, 16, recounted being bitten on the hands and right leg by two sharks during an August 2025 family trip in Belize.
• Fellow divers threw oxygen tanks to deter the shark, and a tourist’s personal tourniquet was used after the boat’s kit lacked lifesaving gear.
• She stayed conscious during a roughly 90-minute ride to an island for a helicopter evacuation and then spent about a month in a Miami hospital.
• Doctors at Children’s Hospital Colorado treated a rare mycobacterial infection, requiring multiple additional operations.
• Carlson has undergone about a dozen surgeries with another scheduled, is using a prosthetic limb, has returned to running, Pilates and scuba diving, and plans a foundation to donate first-aid kits.