A 75-pound spotted eagle ray launched from the ocean at 25 miles per hour struck Judy Kay Zagorski directly in the face on March 20, 2008, while she was boating with family in the waters of Vaca Key, near Marathon, Florida. The 57-year-old woman, from Pigeon, Michigan, was sitting on the bow of the boat next to her sister. Her father, 88-year-old Virgil Bouck, was at the helm. Just 500 yards from shore, the ray leapt from the water and hit her with a force that no one on board could have foreseen or avoided.
Monroe County medical examiner Dr. Michael Hunter determined that Judy died from severe cranioencephalic trauma: multiple skull fractures and direct brain damage from blunt force. There was no venom. There was no attack. The animal’s barb never came into contact with her. The impact also killed the ray. Jorge Pino, spokesperson for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, called it a “freak accident”.
Lynn Gear, a marine wildlife expert at Theater of the Sea in Islamorada, said that rays frequently jump to escape predators, give birth, or rid themselves of parasites, but that she had never heard of such a collision with a human being.
