Girl, 10, bitten by shark in just three feet of water... and doctors have to pull tooth out of her leg

A ten-year-old girl nearly lost one of her legs when she was bitten by a shark -

in just three feet of water. The shark bit Cassidy twice, plunging its jaws in so deeply doctors had to remove one of its teeth from her leg. The terrifying attack happened on Topsail Beach, North Carolina, just one day after she and her family arrived from Pennsylvania on vacation. Cassidy was happily playing with her body board in the shallows, which are only about three-feet deep, when she suddenly felt something pulling on her leg. She told MyFox8: 'It didn't hurt at first. It pulled me down, and it hurt. I thought it was somebody messing around and then I found out that it wasn't.' It bit her once then let go, before coming back and biting her again Then her mother, Carolyn, suddenly noticed blood was swirling in the water. With the help of a friend, Mrs Cartwright raced down to the sea to rescue her daughter. She said: 'When we pulled her out of the water, her leg was just wide open and it was just a lot of blood.' Paramedics airlifted Cassidy to hospital, where doctors found a shark tooth buried deep in her leg. The predator tore through several tendons, including the Achilles. Doctors at the New Hanover Regional Medical Center told Mrs Cartwright it was the worst bite they had ever seen. She said: 'I thought for sure there wasn't any way they were going to be able to put it back together.' She said she had no idea there were sharks in the sea off Tosail Beach. 'Nobody ever told me. Had I known, I wouldn't have put her in the water,' she said. Steve Foster, manager of North Topsail Beach, said: 'I think the one thing that people don't understand is is that there are sharks in the water. 'That's where they live, but people are not one of the main things they want to go after. But as far as response, I think we responded appropriately in this situation.'