Crystal Lake mom survives flying ray collision
A Crystal Lake family on vacation in the Florida Keys got the scare of their life last week when a 300-pound eagle ray shot out of the water and knocked Jenny Hausch to the deck of the boat.
“All I remember is being underneath it, and trying to push it off me,” she told the Florida Keys Keynoter in an interview. “I was scared for the kids. It was definitely the scariest thing that’s ever happened to me.”
The Hausch family was on the bow of a chartered 26-foot tour boat on Friday on their annual trip to the Florida Keys when the ray measuring 5.5 feet across made its 15-foot leap, the Florida Keys Keynoter reported.
“It happened so fast, in a split second,” she told the Keynoter. “It hit me in the chest and knocked me back.”
Hausch was lucky to escape the freak occurrence unscathed, as the rays have a sharp barb on the end of their tails. A similar barb to the one that killed “Crocodile Hunter” Steve Irwin.
“I remember seeing it come out of the water, and thinking it was coming toward us and that there was nothing we could do to get out of the way,” she said in the interview.
Hausch’s 6-year-old daughter was standing right in front of her when the ray jumped and the ray must have sailed over her before crashing down on Hausch.In the end, the family was left with a souvenir, a tail barb that the ray left behind on the boat.
#147;The Florida officers did a great job,#148; she told the Keynoter.
#147;We didn#146;t want the ray hurt, it#146;s such a pretty animal. We just didn#146;t want to see it in the boat with us.#148;