Torrance college student killed by 3 sharks while snorkeling in Bahamas

A 21-year-old Torrance woman was killed Wednesday in a brutal shark attack while on vacation with her family in the Bahamas.

Jordan Lindsey was snorkeling about 2 p.m. near Rose Island northeast of Nassau when she was attacked by three sharks. Her arms, legs and buttocks were bitten and her right arm was severed, according to Paul Rolle, deputy commissioner for the Royal Bahamas Police Force.

Lindsey’s parents saw the predators and yelled to warn her, but she didn’t hear them in time, KABC-TV reported. She was taken to a hospital in New Providence where she was pronounced dead, according to the Bahamas Ministry of Tourism.

It is not clear what type of sharks attacked Lindsey, but officials have issued “precautionary advisories to the public” in response to the attack, according to the Ministry of Tourism.

“Jordan was 21 and such a great daughter and person. We already miss her terribly,” her father, Michael Lindsey, said in a statement to ABC News.

Lindsey’s family wrote on a GoFundMe page, created to help cover funeral costs and expenses related to transporting her body back to California, that the young woman “had the most beautiful, gentle soul.” More than 200 people had donated over $11,000 as of Thursday morning.

Lindsey attended Loyola Marymount University, where she was majoring in communications studies.

The university’s president, Timothy Law Snyder, wrote in a statement Thursday that Lindsey was a “devoted animal lover and climate change advocate” who had transferred to the university from Santa Monica College.

Lindsey participated in the LMU Entrepreneurship Society, the Tau Sigma National Honor Society and worked as a communications assistant for the Seaver College of Science and Engineering. She was also a student researcher with the college’s Center for Urban Resilience, Snyder wrote.

The university plans to honor Lindsey with a plaque bearing her name at the school’s student memorial.

Experts say shark attacks on humans remain are rare, and fatal attacks are even more unusual. University of Florida researchers reported that people worldwide had 130 interactions with sharks last year. Five of those were fatal, which researches say is in line with the global average of six fatalities per year.

Associated Press contributed to this report