Woman recounts shark attack that took her arm

— -- A North Carolina woman left her home for what was supposed to be a fun-in-the-sun vacation in the Bahamas but returned a shark attack survivor.

Tiffany Johnson was snorkeling at a shallow reef when she felt a bump from behind.

“I casually turned to my right to look to see, and that’s when I was face to face with the shark,” she told Charlotte, North Carolina, ABC affiliate WSOC-TV.

A struggle ensued as the shark clamped down on her right arm for a few minutes before Johnson, the mother of three, managed to get away.

“I kept trying to yank my hand back, and the last time I yanked, he had cut it clean off, so I was able to actually get free,” she added.

Her husband, James Johnson, jumped to her rescue, and doctors in the Bahamas managed to stopped the bleeding.

Now home in North Carolina, Tiffany Johnson is scheduled for surgery on Friday to prepare her arm for a prosthesis.