Boy, 13, with 1,000 Stitches from Shark Attack Hopes to Swim Again: I 'Wanna Get Back Out There'

Char Adams
Updated

Keane Webre-Hayes sustained traumatic wounds to his upper body, undergoing at least five hours of surgery, and getting 1,000 stitches to repair his torn upper back, shoulder, torso and face, after he was bitten by a shark on Sept. 29.

Despite the horrific ordeal, though, the 13-year-old says he’s eager to swim again.

“[I] definitely wanna get back out there,” Webre-Hayes told a classroom full of students when he returned to school on Wednesday, according to Good Morning America. He told the class he hopes to get back to surfing, “really, really soon.”

Wednesday marked the boy’s first public statements regarding the September incident. Webre-Hayes was diving for lobsters with a friend just off the coast of Encinitas, a popular beach city in San Diego County, California, when an at least 10-foot shark attacked.

“When I was in the water, I was like, ‘This is probably a big fish,’ ” Webre-Hayes recalled to the students. “Then my mind instantly went to shark.”

RELATED: Mother of 13-Year-Old Boy Bitten by Shark Says She Heard the Attack, Calls Son a ‘Miracle’

The great white shark bit into the boy’s upper body, but Webre-Hayes was able to make it to a nearby kayak, according to GMA.

RELATED VIDEO: How to Survive a Shark Attack, According to Experts

The kayaker, Chad Hammel, previously told CBS News that he heard the boy “in a panic.”

“Once we threw him up on the kayak and started heading in, that’s when I looked back, and the shark was behind the kayak,” Hammel recalled to FOX 5. “He didn’t want to give up yet.”

Keane was airlifted to Rady Children’s Hospital where he underwent at least five hours of surgery, according to GMA.

RELATED: 13-Year-Old Boy in Serious Condition After Being Attacked by 10-Foot Shark in San Diego County

Dr. Tim Fairbanks, chief of pediatric surgery at Rady’s, told the Associated Press that the shark bit deep into the boy’s body, reaching his chest wall. The bite tore Webre-hayes’ left upper back, torso, shoulder, face and ear.

Fairbanks told ABC News that Webre-Hayes has a long road to recovery ahead of him, which will “start with baby steps.”

As for Webre-Hayes, he told GMA that he likes sharks more now than he did before the attack, and he’s eager to go lobster diving again — especially with his new lifetime fish and game license presented by the California Wildlife Officers Foundation, according to KNSD.

But when he does, “he’ll be wrapped in bubble wrap,” his mother, Ellie Hayes, said to the students.