Alabama girl waves her new prosthetic arm in welcome home parade after losing two limbs in shark attack while at beach
The Alabama teen who lost a hand and a leg in a shark attack in Florida is finally home, showing off her new prosthetics to a line of supporters.
Lulu Gribbin, 15, was attacked by a shark on June 7 during a mother-daughter outing to Walton Beach.
The shark had bitten off Gribbins’ left hand and doctors had to amputate her right leg halfway, from her knee to her hip. Her boyfriend McCray Faust, 17, also suffered injuries to her foot.
After 11 weeks at Sacred Heart Hospital in Pensacola and Levine Children’s Hospital in Charlotte, North Carolina, the teenager finally returned home to Mountain Brook, Alabama, on Friday.
Gribbin was greeted by a procession of people dressed in purple β her favorite color β and rode along on the back of a golf cart, waving her prosthetic arm to the crowd.
Lulu Gribbin (right), 15, received a welcome parade after losing a hand and a leg in a shark attack in Florida
The teen documented her recovery on Instagram and showed she’s kept her sense of humor by wearing a shirt that read, “Before you ask, it was a shark”
“We are incredibly grateful to have our family under one roof for the first time in 77 days. We look forward to the next chapter of our family and all that Lulu will accomplish,” her mother Ann Blair Gribbin said in an update to CaringBridge.
Supporters attending the parade said they came to show Gribbin how strong and inspiring she is.
βI was just thinking about how inspiring she is and that she keeps going because I don’t know if I could do what she did,β said seventh-grader Kennedy Romeo. WVTMβIt was amazing to see her recovery.β
“I’m here to support her,” Leslie Higgins said. “She’s a very strong individual and if I was I would be freaking out. I want to tell her, ‘You’re a strong individual, you’re a strong woman. Keep going.'”
The teenager has been documenting her recovery on Instagram, sharing photos and videos of herself learning to use her new prosthetics.
Gribbin was swimming at Walton Beach on June 7 when she was attacked by a shark. Pictured: Emergency workers rush to airlift shark bite victims to hospital
In one photo, she is seen smiling broadly as she tries out her prosthetic leg. She wears a shirt that reads, “Before you ask, it was a shark.”
Gribbin tried adaptive sports like basketball, soccer, and cycling. She was even allowed to attend an NFL preseason game between the Jets and Panthers as a physician-led therapeutic outing.
The teenager’s brutal attack occurred around 3 p.m. that fateful day, when Gribbin and her friends were swimming near a sandbar.
A crowd formed around the ocean’s edge, which had been evacuated by Walton County authorities and lifeguards. Then Gribbins’ twin sister Ellie came to their mother and told her that Gribbins had been attacked.
“I saw her wounds on her leg and I started screaming. She was lifeless, her eyes closed, her mouth white and pale. The wound on her leg, or what was left of her leg, looked like something out of a movie,” the mother said.
Gribbin’s (pictured) was attacked a few hours after a 45-year-old Virginia woman, Elisabeth Foley, was bitten by a shark four miles away around 1:15 p.m.
Two men were able to pull Gribbin from the water and several medical professionals on the beach ran to assist.
She was then flown by helicopter to a trauma center in Pensacola in critical condition.
Just four miles away that same day, a 45-year-old Virginia woman, Elisabeth Foley, was bitten by a shark around 1:15 p.m.
She suffered severe injuries to her abdomen and pelvic area, and the lower part of one of her arms had to be amputated.
Alabama Senator Katie Britt has introduced a bill in the teen’s honor, called Lulu’s Law, which would allow for emergency phone calls about shark attacks.