An Australian man repeatedly punched a great white shark until it released his wife’s leg. The couple was surfing at a beach near Port Macquarie, 386 kilometers from Sydney on Saturday morning, when a shark bit the wife twice on her leg and injured her right thigh.

The police in a statement said: “Her companion was forced to punch the fish until it let go.” Paramedics attended the 35-year old at the beach before airlifting her to a major hospital for surgery. 

According to a Sydney Morning Herald report, Chantelle Doyle, 35 was attacked by a great white shark of two to three metre while surfing at Shelly beach. The report added that Doyle had suffered several lacerations to her right leg.

Her husband Mark Rapley who punched the shark to save her, later played down his effort, telling the Daily Telegraph that he “did what anyone would have done in that moment” 

Surf Life Saving NSW chief Steven Pearce said that Doyle’s husband jumped off his surfboard right onto the shark.

He added, “This fella paddled over and jumped off his board onto the shark and hit it to get it to release her and then assisted her back into the beach” and quipped “pretty full on, really heroic”.

According to witness Jed Toohey who was surfing nearby when the attack happened, what Mark Rapley did was heroic.

Toohey told the Daily Telegraph “He(Mark Rapley) started laying into the shark because it wouldn’t let go, He saved her life… He was really incredible.”

Australia has one of the world’s highest incidences of shark attacks, claimed an AFP report. The report also added that there have already been five fatal shark attacks in the country this year. A child aged 10 was pulled off from a fishing boat in Tasmania last month, the child survived after the father intervened to save him.