New Smyrna Beach is a city in Volusia County, Florida, United States, located on the central east coast of the state, with the Atlantic Ocean to the east. The downtown section of the city is located on the west side of the Indian River and the Indian River Lagoon system. The Coronado Beach Bridge crosses the Intracoastal Waterway just south of Ponce de Leon Inlet, connecting the mainland with the beach on the coastal barrier island. Its population is 30,142 in 2020 by the United States Census Bureau.
Bethany Meilani Hamilton is an American professional surfer and writer. In 2003, she survived a shark attack in which her left arm was bitten off; ultimately, she returned to professional surfing and wrote about her experiences in the 2004 autobiography, Soul Surfer: A True Story of Faith, Family, and Fighting to Get Back on the Board. The book was adapted into the 2011 feature film, Soul Surfer. Hamilton attributes her strength to her Christian faith.
A shark attack is an attack on a human by a shark. Every year, around 80 unprovoked attacks are reported worldwide. Despite their rarity, many people fear shark attacks after occasional serial attacks, such as the Jersey Shore shark attacks of 1916, and horror fiction and films such as the Jaws series. Out of more than 500 shark species, only three are responsible for a double-digit number of fatal, unprovoked attacks on humans: the great white, tiger, and bull. The oceanic whitetip has probably killed many more shipwreck and plane crash survivors, but these are not recorded in the statistics. Humans are not part of a shark's normal diet. Sharks usually feed on small fish and invertebrates, seals, sea lions, and other marine mammals. A shark attack will usually occur if the shark feels curious or confused.
The Satanic Verses is the fourth novel of British-Indian writer Salman Rushdie. First published in September 1988, the book was inspired by the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. As with his previous books, Rushdie used magical realism and relied on contemporary events and people to create his characters. The title refers to the Satanic Verses, a group of Quranic verses about three pagan Meccan goddesses: Allāt, Al-Uzza, and Manāt. The part of the story that deals with the satanic verses was based on accounts from the historians al-Waqidi and al-Tabari.
Lazarus of Bethany is a figure within the Christian Bible, mentioned in the New Testament in the Gospel of John, who four days after his death is restored to life by Jesus. This is seen by Christians as one of the miracles of Jesus. In the Eastern Orthodox Church, Lazarus is venerated as Righteous Lazarus, the Four-Days Dead. The Eastern Orthodox and Catholic traditions offer varying accounts of the later events of his life.
The California Surf Museum is a museum located at 312 Pier View Way in Oceanside, California, dedicated to archiving and displaying surfboards, surf art, memorabilia, surfing equipment, photographs, magazines, videos, and more. The California Surf Museum's permanent time line of surfboards includes wooden boards from the early 1900s to today's modern boards. The museum has rotating exhibits and is visited by an estimated 20,000 people annually. It was founded in 1986 in Encinitas, California and subsequently moved to Pacific Beach before settling in Oceanside in 1991. The current location is a 5,100-square-foot (470 m2) building located in downtown Oceanside close to the pier. The museum hosts a number of events annually including a fundraising gala, three-day Surf Film Festival, "Legends Day", book signings, concerts and more. The California Surf Museum is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization.
Lorraine Broussard Nicholson is an American actress and director. She is known for playing Alana Blanchard in the biographical film Soul Surfer (2011).
Jane Hamilton is an American novelist.
Jaws is a novel by American writer Peter Benchley, published in 1974. It tells the story of a large great white shark that preys upon a small Long Island resort town and the three men who attempt to kill it. The novel grew out of Benchley's interest in shark attacks after he learned about the exploits of Montauk, New York shark fisherman Frank Mundus in 1964. Doubleday commissioned him to write the novel in 1971, a period when Benchley worked as a freelance journalist.
Anita Frances Mason was an English novelist, best known as a Booker Prize nominee. She was the author of eight novels, including The Illusionist (1983), The Racket (1990), and The Right Hand of the Sun (2008).
A soul surfer is a surfer who surfs for the sheer pleasure of surfing. Although they may still enter competitions, winning is not the soul surfer's main motive, since they scorn the commercialization of surfing. The term denotes a spirituality of surfing. As Brad Melekian stated in a 2005 article in Surfer magazine:
to pursue surfing not just as an athletic endeavor or as a sunny day diversion, but to try to glean whatever lessons you can from the practice. It means being aware of your surroundings, and respectful of the people and places that you interact with. It means being patient, mindful, kind, compassionate, understanding, active, thoughtful, faithful, hopeful, gracious, disciplined and...good.
Wilcox Medical Center is part of Hawaii Pacific Health's network. One of Kauaʻi island's three hospitals, Wilcox Medical Center provides Kauaʻi residents with an imaging center, emergency department, and surgical center.
Bethany (Greek: Βηθανία, which is probably of Aramaic or Hebrew origin, meaning “House of Affliction" is a feminine given name derived from the Biblical place name, Bethany, a town near Jerusalem, at the foot of the Mount of Olives, where Lazarus lived in the New Testament, along with his sisters, Mary and Martha, and where Jesus stayed during Holy Week before his crucifixion.
The Australian Shark-Incident Database has recorded that between 1791 and April 2018 there were 1,068 shark attacks in Australia with 237 of them being fatal.
Soul Surfer is a 2011 American biographical drama film directed by Sean McNamara, based on the 2004 memoir Soul Surfer: A True Story of Faith, Family, and Fighting to Get Back on the Board by Bethany Hamilton about her life as a surfer after losing her left arm in a horrific shark attack and her recovery. The film stars AnnaSophia Robb, Helen Hunt, Dennis Quaid, and Lorraine Nicholson with Carrie Underwood, Kevin Sorbo, Sonya Balmores, Branscombe Richmond, and Craig T. Nelson.
Alana Rene Blanchard is an American professional surfer and model. Blanchard has surfed on the ASP World Tour.
I Am Second is a US multimedia movement and not-for-profit organization that is designed to inspire people to "put Jesus Christ first" in their lives. It was founded in 2008 by Norm Miller, the CEO and Chairman of the Interstate Battery System of America, in partnership with a group of individuals from e3 Partners Ministry, an evangelical group.
Women's surfing is thought to date back to the 17th century. One of the earliest records of women surfing is of princess Keleanohoana’api’api, also known as Kalea or the Maui Surf Riding Princess. It is rumored that Kalea was the trailblazer of surfing and could surf better than both men and women. A few centuries later in the mid-late 1800s, Thrum’s Hawaiian Annual reported that women in ancient Hawaii surfed in equal numbers and frequently better than men. Over the last 50 years, women's surfing has grown in popularity.
Sheryl Berk is an American writer. She is the co-author of the New York Times Bestseller Soul Surfer as well as other celebrity biographies. She is the author of the children's book series Dance Divas. She also co-authored three children's and young adult novel series: The Cupcake Club, Fashion Academy, and Ask Emma, along with her daughter Carrie Berk.
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