A 19-year-old body boarder was killed in a shark attack Friday at Surf Beach in Central California, according to the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Department.
On Friday afternoon, the sheriff's office identified the victim as Lucas McKaine Ransom of Romoland, Calif. He was a junior at UC Santa Barbara where he was majoring in chemical engineering, according to deputies.
"(Ransom) was boogie boarding on the break line about 100 yards off the beach with his friend when a shark suddenly pulled Ransom under the water. Ransom suffered a massive wound to his left leg and appeared to die shortly thereafter," deputies said in a news release.
Santa Barbara County Sheriff Bill Brown said a friend on a surfboard got the victim to shore but it was too late.
Surf Beach is on the property of Vandenberg Air Force Base but is open to the public. The beach is about 130 miles northwest of Los Angeles.
Vandenberg said the base closed the beach and two others for 72 hours.
The last such attack at Surf Beach was in 2008, when a shark bit a surfer's board. A great white shark killed a woman in 2003 at Avila Beach, about 30 miles north of Vandenberg.
