A man kite surfing off a Florida beach passed Wednesday after being enclosed and attacked by sharks.

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The Martin County Sheriff's Office said a lifeguard first saw the man in suffering at 4:15 p.m. about 500 yards from shore close to Stuart, on the Atlantic seashore.

The lifeguard paddled out into rough water and found sharks encircling 38-year-old Stephen Howard Schafer.

The lifeguard put Schafer on his rescue board and paddled back to shore. Paramedics took Schafer to a hospital, where he later died.

Victim bitten several times

Daniel Wouters, of Martin County Fire Rescue, told ABC-affiliate news station WPBF that when he was spotted Schafer was “just flowing onto his board… not normal activity for a kite surfer.”

“When (paramedics) got on that point, they saw a number of sharks in the sea and they found the victim had been bitten several times,” Wouters said, according to a report on the WPBF's Web site.

“They were able to point him onto the kite to basically somewhat protect him and bring him on set ashore.”

Jim Smith, who witnessed the rescue, stated WPBF that the savers had done all they could. “I can't emphasise enough — they did their best. The guy just wasn't moving,” he said.

Young great white sharks suspected

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Research scientist Grant Gilmore told The Palm Beach Post it was very unusual for sharks to bite humans off Florida's eastern seashore at this time of year. He added it should be possible to tell which sharks were responsible from the bite marks.

“It would be nice to have closure on this, to know what it was, particularly since the man, tragically, died,” he told the newspaper.

Gilmore said of the four species known to attack humans in the area, great hammerheads, bulls and tigers all prefer warm water and leave or go deep in winter. “The only other species that gathers in abundance out there in the winter are the juvenile great white sharks,” Gilmore told The Palm Peach Post.

'Best person ever'

Friends spoke of their shock at the attack.

“I've never heard of multiple sharks in this field surrounding somebody and fatally wounding him,” the victim's childhood friend, Teague Taylor, 36, told The Palm Beach Post.

Jordan Schwartz stated the newspaper Schafer was a very knowledgeable kiteboard surfer and “a great pleasant guy, always mellow, I don't think he had any enemies.”

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