'I was just, like, pulling my board, and people were yelling, 'Get out the water, get out the water!'' one of the surfers, Nisi Schlanger, told NBC New York. 'I thought I was dead.'
The other surfer recalled: 'I just swam for my life right there, just dreading the moment the shark was gonna pull me in and suck me in.'
Beachgoers on Cape Cod were warned earlier this summer that a boom in shark activity could see as many as 150 Great Whites in the waters this year.
Nauset Beach in Orleans, Massachusetts closed on Monday after the attack, which terrified beachgoers who thought the trail of blood in the water was from a human. A pair of surfers were just feet away when the shark, believed to be a Great White, ripped into a seal. Screams pealed from the beach as the frantic surfers paddled for shore, a video shot at the beach shows,The Massachusetts Marine Fisheries said numbers have been climbing in recent years, with a regional population of 147 in 2016 - more than double the number, 68, in 2014.
Scientist Gregory Skomal, who started tracking shark numbers with a team at the MMF, said tagging research shows the sharks 'do come back each year', the Boston Herald reports.
'When you have overlap with humans, you do get the potential for these interactions, you know, a shark biting a person' Skomal said, before adding the killer fish aren't hunting humans - as was the case in Jaws, which was filmed in nearby Martha's Vineyard.