GALVESTON — An 8-year-old Central Texas girl is recovering in the hospital after being bitten by a shark while swimming in Galveston over the weekend, according to KWTX.

The girl, identified by her family as Harper Ochoa, was playing in shallow water when she felt something grab the back of her leg, her mother, Christa, told KWTX. Harper pushed the animal away and began screaming.

Her family then noticed part of her leg was missing just below the calf. “At first we thought, you know what is a stingray? It was just so much blood it was hard to tell kind of what was going on,” Christa told the station. “Then when they were able to kind of get it to stop bleeding… the doctor was able to confirm that it looked like something from a shark and she got 13 staples in the back of her leg.”

Doctors plan to keep Harper in the hospital for a few days while she receives antibiotics, KWTX reported. Her mother said she is doing well given the circumstances.

Photo: Ronald Woan, Creative Commons CC.