Florida surfer bitten by shark on same beach, 11 years apart:

It’s a fin-tastic story about survival.

A Florida surfer is lucky to be alive after being bitten by a shark – on the very same beach where he survived a similar attack 11 years ago.

Cole Taschman, 28, was waving with his friends at Bathtub Beach in Stuart last week when a large shark latched onto both feet. he told WPTV.

“I looked behind me and he was like, ‘Ahhh’ at the back of me, and I just looked and saw the last second of him,” Taschman said of the moment the shark attacked.

“Both feet were in the shark’s mouth at the same time,” he said added to NBC.

“I looked back and caught a glimpse of him, with a very wide nose, and I screamed… I thought, I’m dead.”

“It was a beast. It was a big one,” said Taschman, who estimated the shark must have been about 8 to 8 feet long.

Eleven years earlier, Taschman was eaten by another shark on the same beach, he said.

“The first one was a little reef pup,” he recalled, saying his injuries were “no comparison” to the latter, leaving him with multiple severed tendons in his foot.

“It’s like comparing an Olympic athlete to a high school athlete. The amount of trauma, it was so hectic, the amount of power this had,” Taschman said of the chaotic scene that unfolded when he finally made landfall.

“They said I was walking and I had three severed tendons,” he told the outlet.

Taschman can be heard shouting, “I was bitten by a shark!” in a short video clip captured by his girlfriend.

Taschman’s girlfriend, two friends and a food truck operator got him into a car and made tourniquets from surfboard straps as they ran to the hospital.

“I actually blacked out,” Taschman said. ‘Ana sits in the back and slaps me. Zack drives like crazy going to the hospital, he pours cold water on my head and keeps me awake, thank God.”

Taschman was eventually transferred to St. Mary’s Medical Center in West Palm Beach, where he underwent two surgeries and received a total of 93 stitches.

“The shark’s injury was very impressive, just as the cuts from the shark’s teeth are almost as clean as from the blades, the surgical steel we use in our operations,” one of his team’s surgeons told NBC.

“I lost almost the entire part of my ankle, and on this foot I don’t even know how I still have toes, to tell you the truth,” Taschman added.

Taschman was discharged this week, although he still has months of rehabilitation ahead of him.

He has no insurance and will be away for a few months as captain of a fishing charter.

As of Friday morning, a GoFundMe to help with his medical expenses had raised nearly $7,000 of its $30,000 goal.

Taschman said he hoped his twin shark attacks would remind people never to surf alone.

“Don’t surf alone and make sure you know what you are doing,” he warned.

“Know how to use a belt as a tourniquet, know how to be prepared for these activities,” he said. “It’s good advance planning, you know?”