The two women were in shallow water on a remote beach in Daintree National Park in North Queensland around 10:30 p.m. Sunday when the attack occurred, CNN reported.
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The woman, in her 40s, was with a female friend at Thornton Beach in Daintree, north of Townsville, when she went missing about 10.30pm Sunday.
The friend was being treated for a graze and shock.
In 1985 a giant crocodile known as Big Jim took local postal worker Beryl Wruck while she was having a late-night swim about an hour’s drive from Thornton Beach.
Ms King aired concerns visitors weren’t taking the danger posed by the reptiles seriously despite warnings from tour operators and countless signs.
THE friend of a woman thought to have been killed in a Queensland crocodile attack was left “extremely traumatised” by the incident.
A tourist has been snatched by a crocodile during a night swim in Australia.
Police did not identify the woman or give her nationality but said she lives in Australia and has family in New Zealand.
On Monday, Senior Constable Russell Parker revealed details about the struggle which saw the 46-year-old woman taken away by a crocodile.
If fears about the woman’s fate play out, it will be the second fatality involving a crocodile in a fortnight.
Neil Noble from the Queensland state ambulance service told ABC that a 5-meter crocodile had been spotted in the area recently.
The tragedy has garnered commentary from locals and community members, including federal MP Warren Entsch, who, on Monday, said the apparently fatal attack was “avoidable” and the result of “human stupidity”.
“Look, obviously there’s grave concerns for her safety, but we will continue this as a search and rescue mission, and we’ll continue on that vein”, Lukin said.
Despite those calls, crocodile expert Dan Bamblett says he’s concerned that “in the past, there have been a few animals that have paid the price for one animal’s deeds”.
However, University of Queensland zoology professor Craig Franklin has said warmer-than-average water temperatures through climate change would make crocodiles encounters in these more heavily populated areas increasingly more common.
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Crocodile numbers have increased since the introduction of protection laws in 1971, with estimates putting the Northern Territory’s population in the wild at about 100,000.
