Lauren O’Neill: Major health update after swimmer nearly had her leg torn off by a vicious bull shark in Sydney Harbour’s Elizabeth Bay

A young woman mauled by a bull shark in Sydney Harbour is recovering in hospital after a marathon surgery to save her right leg.

Lauren O’Neill, 29, lost litres of blood after the shark ripped open her leg below the knee and bit through to the bone on Monday, but her limb was saved by surgeons at St Vincent’s who operated on her through the night.

The good news came as Ms O’Neill’s mother Petra thanked veterinarian Fiona Crago, whose quick action and medical knowledge saved her daughter’s life. 

‘It means a lot that the community was there at the critical moment to render assistance, in particular the veterinary …

‘(It) shows what a lovely community you are,’ Mrs O’Neill wrote online.

Emergency services rushed to a private wharf in in Elizabeth Bay at 7.45pm on Monday to find Ms O’Neill with a severe bite to her right leg and suffering ‘major blood loss’.

But before that, Dr Crago and her wife Georgia, who live in a nearby apartment,  ran to help after hearing repeated screams of ‘shark attack!’.

Dr Crago, a former lawyer and TV producer who retrained as a vet around a decade ago, had grabbed two compression bandages her wife had only just bought that day for another purpose. 

The couple discovered a scene of horror as their neighbour Ms O’Neill lay on the private jetty stained with blood.

‘She was severely mauled on her right leg and she was losing a lot of blood,’ Dr Crago told Channel 10.

‘Neighbours had already started to render first aid to her. We had quite a few people that were so helpful.

‘People were throwing down towels and blankets to keep her warm but I just focused on what I had to do, which was to stem the blood flow and bandage the leg as best I can with what I had and just stabilise it. And then put a tourniquet on.’

Dr Crago, whose actions saved Ms O’Neill’s life, said she normally carried bandages due to her work but in recent days did not have the usual amount to hand as she had swapped cars. 

‘But as a strange coincidence, my wife had actually gone up the road and bought two new compression bandages yesterday for another purpose, so I knew exactly where they were and just grabbed them, so it was quite lucky,’ she said.

Her wife Georgia, who was interviewed on Monday night in the aftermath of the attack, said if Ms O’Neill had ‘got bitten (further) out there, she wouldn’t have survived’.

A friend of the couple said Ms O’Neill owes them her life.

‘Fiona knew what she was doing … if it wasn’t for her and her wife Georgia the poor victim would have died,’ the friend told Daily Mail Australia.

‘I’m so so proud of them, they deserve an award. That girl got lucky tonight having them home.’

But Ms Crago refused to accept any praise. ‘I’m in no way heroic, I just did my job and I just did what I was trained to do,’ she said.

Elizabeth Bay resident Michael Porter, who rang triple zero, also praised Dr Crago.

‘She was an absolute hero… and I think she saved her life,’ he told the Today Show.

‘She had wraps and tourniquets and just got straight into emergency mode, and we were all just sort of there together as a team.’

Mr Porter said Ms O’Neill was swimming outside a ‘netted harbour pool’ and was ‘swimming around the boats’.

‘Her leg was sort of trailing behind her, and the water behind her was all red with blood.’

He added despite being in a ‘complete state of shock’ from the trauma of the attack, Ms O’Neill was ‘very lucid’.

‘People were holding her hand and helping her and she was extremely brave the whole time,’ he said.

Ms O’Neill studied science at the University of Sydney and works for the NSW government in the Department of Climate Change.

She has volunteered for a range of charities and organisations since 2012, when she was 15.

According to her LinkedIn profile, Ms O’Neill has given her time to the SES, the Fred Hollows Foundation, Pink Ribbon Day, Daffodil Day and Spinal Cord Injury Australia.

She has served meals for the homeless, helped create a map of wheelchair-accessible public toilets and walked foster dogs.

City of Sydney Councillor Linda Scott said she was ‘extremely concerned’ to hear about the attack.

‘Please, stay out of the harbour until further notice,’ she said on social media.

‘Thank you to the bystanders who stood in to bravely help, and to St Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney for their care for the victim.’

In February 2022, British man Simon Nellist was killed by 4.5metre great white shark off Little Bay in Sydney’s south-east.

He was the first confirmed fatal victim in Sydney in 60 years.