A swimmer died after suffering “catastrophic injuries” following a shark attack at a popular Sydney beach on Wednesday. This was the first fatal shark attack in the city since 1963, officials said. 

The incident occurred at the Little Bay beach near Malabar in the afternoon, where emergency services found the remains of a man in the waters. New South Wales authorities have not named the victim and are investigating the incident. 

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“Unfortunately this person had suffered catastrophic injuries and there wasn’t a lot paramedics could do when we arrived,” news.com.au quoted an NSW ambulance spokeswoman as saying. 

The Little Bay beach, along with a few other nearby beaches, have been closed to visitors for 24 hours. 

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The attack happened at around 16:30 local time when there were dozens of people at the beach, swimming in the waters and fishing on the nearby rocks, Sky News Australia reported. 

“Someone just got eaten by a shark,” a man can be heard saying in a video that has surfaced online, adding that it was a “big great white”. 

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“Some guy was swimming and a shark came and attacked him vertically,” a witness told Nine News. “We heard a yell and turned around it looked like a car had landed in the water”. 

The witness claimed the shark was around 4.5 meters long. 

Another witness told ABC news that the swimmer “was yelling at first, and then when he went down there were so many splashes.”

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“He just went down for a swim, enjoying the day, but that shark took his life.”

There were big splashes and the waters turned red, with birds starting to circle above as the attack occurred. 

The last fatal shark attack in Sydney occurred at the Sugerloaf beach in 1963. There were three fatal shark attacks in Australia last year, two of which were in New South Wales beaches.