Poopies Reveals The Scary Details Of His Gnarly Jackass Shark Bite
We've already seen some pretty outlandish behavior from Sean "Poopies" McInerney in "Jackass Forever": voluntarily getting bitten by a snake, launching himself into a cactus patch, getting spun around at G-force levels until he vomits. Heck, even the way he got his nickname involves an incident of public defecation.
Poopies had already taken more than his share of hard knocks before the premiere of "Jackass Forever," though. Anyone involved in stunt performance –- as most of the "Jackass" mainstays are –- is bound to sustain their fair share of injuries. In particular, there's that shark bite, which has easily become one of the most unbelievable and terrifying moments in the "Jackass" legendarium. This was during Discovery's "Jackass Shark Week," when in the Bahamas, the crew attempted to re-enact the famous "Happy Days" stunt featuring Fonzie (Henry Winkler) that literally gave us the TV term "jump the shark" (via The Guardian).
That accident –- when Poopies fell from his wakeboard and was mauled by a Caribbean reef shark –- nearly took his life, to say nothing of his hand. His arteries and tendons were severed completely. To this day, even with multiple surgeries and physical therapy, he still has pain and some nasty scars to show for it. Though it's not like he needed any of those to remember what happened.
Poopies remembers the whole thing in slow motion
During an appearance on fellow "Jackass" star Steve-O's podcast, "Steve-O's Wild Ride!," Poopies recounted the experience of having his hand almost ripped off by the shark. "I remember looking at the guys in the boat and ... f*** dude, I'm f***ed, boys," he shared. Sure enough, within seconds, he felt the shark's mouth clamp down on his hand.
"I felt the gums of its mouth," Poopies continued. "Like, it bit my hand and I felt the top of its mouth. The roof of his mouth with my fingers was all slimy and s***." Poopies said that's when he made what might have been a decision that ultimately saved his hand. Something in him knew that if he tried to pull his hand out of the shark's mouth, he would lose it. He made the decision not to pull back, and the shark let him go.
What seems to stick with Poopies is how insanely strong the shark was. "It felt like someone grabbed you with a f***ing robot hand," Poopies told Steve-O, "and just like, you have no– there's– it was so powerful, so muscular... It was a straight muscle that could just take my hand off!"
Poopies' life was saved by a quick-thinking medic
Back on the boat, Steve-O and the rest of the "Jackass" crew watched everything unfold in a matter of seconds. "The first thing that we saw," said Steve-O, "was just Poopies' hand come out of the water, and it's just gushing blood." Meanwhile, the medic who had been driving the jetski towing Poopies on his wakeboard had seen what was happening. He immediately turned around, drove back to Poopies, dove in the water himself, grabbed the "Jackass Forever" star, and brought him back to the boat. "This medic... saved Poopies in such a big way," said Steve-O.
When all was said and done, the medics got Poopies onto their boat — with a tourniquet wrapped around his arm — in less than a minute. From there, it was a 10-minute boat ride back to shore, and a 20-minute ambulance ride to the hospital, where he was later airlifted to Miami for surgery. Interestingly enough, though there have been 27 recorded instances of Caribbean reef sharks attacking humans, none have been fatal, and the species is known as one of the less aggressive shark breeds (via Sharksider).
That's not to say Poopies couldn't have been the first recorded fatality, though. It's still a shark, after all. Watching the video, it is clear to everyone in the room that without the quick action taken by the medics, he would have been shark chum. Even then, though, Poopies didn't seem to lose the signature "Jackass" sense of humor. As the medics' boat sped away to bring him to shore, the last thing he said to Steve-O was "I want a f***ing bonus, dude!"
Alas, Poopies didn't get a bonus.