Sailfish leaps out of water and stabs Florida woman in the groin

A 100-pound sailfish which was being reeled onto a boat off the coast of Florida jumped out of the water, into the air and stabbed a woman in the groin, according to a county sheriff’s office in the US state.

Katherine Perkins, 73, was by the boat’s centre console on 19 July when she was impaled by the fish, which is similar to the swordfish in that it has a pointy bill at the front of it – something you don’t really want near your privates.

She was standing to photograph friends Louis Toth and Dominic Belleza with the catch when the incident occurred, with the two mates applying pressure to the wound as they headed back to dry land.

Katherine was airlifted to hospital, with a HCA Florida Lawnwood Hospital spokesperson telling CNN she was in a good condition.

Martin County Sheriff’s Office said the woman didn’t have time to react to the incident – which occurred two miles out from Stuart, north of Palm Beach – as the fish leapt out of the sea so quickly.

According to National Geographic, sailfish are the fastest fish in the ocean, as they can reach speeds of 68 miles per hour – a fact which is all the more troubling when you consider the fact the animal charged at the boat before ending up in Katherine’s groin.

Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter

It isn’t the first time people on board a boat have been left shocked by a catch, as two fisherman reeled in a “find of a lifetime” back in April in the form of a half-eaten shark.

Shaun Whale and Sammy Hitzke, from Australia, shared a video of the fish with a giant chunk missing from it onto YouTube, where it went viral.

Sammy said: “This is epic. Proper epic. He’s got three-quarters of himself missing – that is a proper monster of the deep.”

The shark was later confirmed to have been a thresher shark, a species often targeted for its skin, livers and meat with their fins used for shark-fin soup.

Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.