A young Swiss woman who was mauled to death by a shark in Australia has been identified as a remarkably fit academic who had just completed her studies.
Livia Mühlheim, 25, and her boyfriend Lukas Schindler, 26, were mauled by a bull shark during an early morning swim in the unpatrolled waters off Kylies Beach at Crowdy Bay, south of Port Macquarie, on Thursday.
Emergency services were called to the beach, known to be a shark hotspot, at about 6.30am following reports that the young Swiss couple had been attacked.
Mr Schindler, an exchange student who had recently qualified as a diving instructor, tried desperately to fight off the three-metre shark as it attacked his girlfriend.
The 25-year-old had been using a GoPro to film a pod of dolphins moments before the shark bit her several times, tearing off her left arm.
Mr Schindler managed to scare it away but not before the animal mauled Ms Mühlheim and bit him twice on the leg as well.
These injuries did not stop him from carrying her 50metres to shore where bystanders immediately jumped in to try and save their lives.
Despite these efforts, Ms Mühlheim succumbed to her injuries before paramedics arrived.
Daily Mail has been told the day before Ms Mühlheim died, the pair were trying to get employment at a Discovery Caravan Park in Harrington because they wanted to stay longer.
A young Swiss couple who were mauled at Crowdy Bay in Port Macquarie have been identified
Livia Mühlheim, 25, was mauled to death by a bull shark on Thursday
Her boyfriend Lukas Schindler, 26, desperately tried to save her
The couple involved in Thursday’s attack were both athletic with backgrounds in various forms of fitness.
Mr Schindler recently completed the Sydney Marathon in a time of 2 hours and 59 minutes in August.
That same month he gained an Open Water Scuba Instructor certificate from the Professional Association of Diving Instructors, which is based in California.
He completed a diving instructors’ course at a Bondi dive centre last week and graduated with a Master of Arts degree at the University of Technology Sydney in the second semester of 2025.
Mr Schindler also worked as a gymnastics coach from 2016 to 2018 before becoming a first lieutenant in the Swiss Armed Forces in 2019.
He studied his Bachelor of Business Administration at the University of St Gallen, where Ms Mühlheim also studied, in 2024.
Ms Mühlheim was a former synchronised swimmer and passionate runner, according to her employer.
She studied her Master’s in Accounting and Finance at the University of St.Gallen, in Switzerland, and had been hired by a financial consulting firm in 2024.
Mr Schindler was bitten twice on the leg as he attempted to ward off the three-metre shark
Both were considered remarkably athletic
The pair worked together as Security Operators at the World Economic Forum and both attended the 51st St. Gallen Symposium for future leaders in Switzerland.
The event focused on challenges of global security, climate action, and intergenerational fairness and was also attended by politicians from around the world.
‘We had entrepreneurs, politicians, activists and academics from all around the globe who did not just ask questions but really challenged the senior leaders and most importantly inspired them with new approaches to make the world a better place,’ Ms Mühlheim wrote at the time.
‘I am so grateful you all made it to St. Gallen and I am so proud of you!’
After the shark attacked on Thursday, Mr Schindler raced to find the closest phone in an attempt to save his girlfriend after laying her down on the sand.
A bystander, in her 40s, saw him and immediately dialed triple-0 whose operator quickly talked her through creating a makeshift tourniquet for Mr Schindler.
Using her swimmers the woman was able to slow the bleeding which ultimately saved his life, authorities later said.
Tragically, Ms Mühlheim could not be saved as her boyfriend was stabilised by emergency services before being flown to John Hunter Hospital via helicopter.
Ms Mühlheim was a keen runner and former synchronised swimmer
Mr Schindler gained his scuba diving certificate in 2025 when he also ran the Sydney marathon and before that he was a gymnast in 2018
A bystander at the scene, Kevin, said he went down to see what was going on after two ambulances and a Land Cruiser raced past his campsite as it was all going down.
‘I went down to the beach to see what was happening and I saw paramedics attending to one person on the beach as well as a second one which was some distance away,’ he told Mid-North Coast News.
Another person at the scene, Robert, said he was enjoying his usual morning walk when he saw the same scenes.
‘One person was on the ground with another leaning over them and there was another man walking around,’ Robert told the publication.
Since this latest attack, there has been a renewed call from the public to get more ‘Shark Bite Kits’ installed along coastlines around the country.
These kits are designed to help control life-threatening bleeding and each contains a tourniquet, two conforming bandages, two large dressings, an emergency thermal blanket, gloves, a whistle and step-by-step instructions on how to treat a shark bite.
Only 150 have been installed across NSW, Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia.
This was the fifth fatal shark attack in Australia this year with the most recent less than three months ago, when a man was killed in Sydney’s northern beaches.
Ms Mühlheim’s death comes less than three months after a different shark fatally attacked Mercury Psillakis, 57, 300km south at Dee Why in September.
A report is being prepared for the coroner.