The weekend of July 29-30 had its fair share of AMI action.
West Manatee Fire Rescue fire marshal Rodney Kwiatkowski, in a July 30 text message to The Islander, said WMFR’s work included a response to a boat crash and a shark bite.
The boat crash involved 11 passengers — six adults and five children — aboard two vessels that collided in the Intracoastal Waterway near Key Royale.
Kwiatkowski said a 41-year-old woman suffered head lacerations and was trauma-alerted to the HCA Florida Blake Hospital in Bradenton.
Nine other passengers were transported to the hospital with “minor injuries,” according to Kwiatkowski.
Also, a man in his early 20s was transported to the hospital for treatment after a shark bite.
Kwiatkowski wrote that the man was bitten in the lower leg while swimming in the Gulf of Mexico at the north end of AMI off Bean Point.
“We are uncertain as to the type of shark or circumstances leading up to the bite,” Kwiatkowski wrote.
A member of the man’s party applied a tourniquet to the leg and took him to the Kingfish Boat Ramp in Holmes Beach, where Manatee County Emergency Medical Services responded and transported the man to the hospital.
His condition, as well as the condition of those injured in the boat crash, was unknown as of July 31, according to Kwiatkowski.