PICTURED: Real estate agent surfer, 46, mauled to death by great white shark at a Gold Coast beach

A surfer who was mauled to death by a great white shark at a netted Gold Coast beach has been identified as a 46-year-old real estate agent. 

Longboard rider Nick Slater was just metres away from other surfers at Greenmount Beach when he was mauled at about 5pm on Tuesday, leaving him with catastrophic injuries.  

At least 40 surfers were in the water when Mr Slater was attacked in the shallows at the popular break.

His death is the first fatal shark attack in the area since 1958. 

The horrific mauling was captured by surf watch cameras and witnessed by at least one other rider. 

Mourners descended on Greenmount Beach on Wednesday morning to pay their respects to the Miami local – as helicopter crews continued their search for the great white.  

A Westpac Lifesaver Rescue helicopter was circling in the area after first light looking for sharks.

Beaches from Burleigh to Snapper Rocks have been closed for the day and lifeguards are patrolling the waters on jet skis.

Thomas Richard Tate, Mayor of the Gold Coast, offered his condolences to Mr Slater’s family on Wednesday morning.  

‘Last time we’ve had a shark attack is 1958, over 60 years ago,’ he told Today.

‘It doesn’t matter how long it’s been, still a devastating shock to the community of the Gold Coast.’ 

The mayor said the beaches would remain closed until it’s determined the shark is no longer in the vicinity. 

Mr Tate said the shark attack was a reminder to all beachgoers to ‘look after your mates’.

‘I mean really it brings to reality, when we go off the land we go into water, it is the shark’s domain,’ he said. 

Footage from a Swellnet surf camera shows Mr Slater sitting in the water at the end of the line-up before the shark grabs him and pulls him under.

Water can be seen splashing around before the black silhouette of the shark swims away. 

Some surfers just metres away seem oblivious to what is happening.

Mr Slater is then seen floating face down in the water before fellow board-riders drag him to shore. 

The bite stretched from his upper thigh to his knee and a tooth from the predator remained lodged in his longboard.  

Coastalwatch footage showed the moment directly after the attack, when a surfer paddled the victim to shore with the help of other beachgoers. 

Lifeguards are seen waiting on the sand before frantically working to treat the severe injury. 

The water was evacuated as lifeguards attempted to save the victim.

Emergency crews rushed to the popular tourist spot but the real estate agent could not be saved.

Mr Slater, who was surfing alone, was pronounced dead minutes after they arrived.

Surfer Jade Parker told 7News he first spotted a school of fish and up to 30 birds near the victim, which is what attracted the shark to the surfer. 

He had been walking along the footpath near a lookout when he noticed some commotion in the water.

‘There were four or five people yelling and pointing at the water, and I looked out to where they were pointing and I spotted a board floating and a body was next to it,’ he said.

Mr Parker just assumed the surfer had been knocked out because he wasn’t moving so he ran down to the beach and swam to the victim, who was in waist deep water.

‘There were about three on the scene before me and they were all trying to drag him in with the board he had. I helped drag him into the beach as well.’ 

When they arrived on the sand lifeguards were waiting with a stretcher but Mr Parker said he was ‘pretty much gone’ by the time they arrived.

Mr Parker said the injury stretched from the ‘groin area to just below his knee’.

‘It was pretty much all taken… there was nothing there, it was just hanging there by not much,’ he said. 

‘Honestly, I do not want to get to the gory parts but he was in a bad way. He was not conscious. It looked like he had already pretty much passed away at that point in time.’

Mr Parker added that the attack would not put him off surfing.

‘I know the sharks are always out there so I will just have to accept that fate,’ he said. 

Queensland Ambulance Supervisor William Houghton said the man had been surfing with a few other gentlemen. 

‘It was actually witnessed by one of the other surfers, they saw him being attacked by the shark,’ he said.

Mr Houghton said lifesavers provided first aid on the beach.

‘It was a pretty traumatic event for everybody concerned,’ he said.

Greenmount Beach, located near the Queensland-New South Wales border, has shark control equipment including drum lines.

It is not yet known how the shark avoided the nets to get to the man. 

Pictures show paramedics and lifeguards desperately tending to the man’s injuries in the back of a beach buggy. 

Members of the public were seen holding up a sheet to cover him as he receives treatment for the bite. 

The attack is the first on the Gold Coast since 2012, when a 20-year-old surfer was mauled at Nobby Beach.

It is the first fatal attack in the region in 62 years when Peter Gerard Spronk was killed in 1958.

He was mauled by a shark 250m off Surfers Paradise beach and died of his injuries despite lifesavers coming to his rescue.