Mangaluru : Mangalurean based 49-year-old US female tourist was killed by a tiger shark this week while diving off a Costa Rican island in the Pacific Ocean, Costa Rican island on Thursday November 30.
Rohina Bhandari 49, a private equity director from New York City and was the sister of Dr Nitin Bhandary, who resides in Mangaluru.
The attack also badly injured the 26-year-old male Costa Rican diving guide leading the group that included Bhandari.
The shark savaged the two on Thursday as they were surfacing after a dive off Cocos Island, a pristine national park located 300 miles off the Costa Rican mainland, the environment ministry said in a statement.
Bhandari was said to have sustained fatal bite marks on both of her legs.
It stressed the attack was ‘an isolated incident’ and the first one of such seriousness recorded for the island.
According to the Costa Rican newspaper La Nacion, the guide noticed the shark approaching his group underwater and tried to scare it away.
But as they surfaced, the shark went for the American woman, tearing at her legs.