Mike,
He was evidently swimming on top of a stingray, and the barb on it's stinger pierced his chest and his heart. I worked for a time with rays in Laguna a long while ago. Some of the barbs are as long as 9-10 inches. When the barbs stand erect, they can be dangerous as the can penetrate very easily. Some even have barbs on them like a fish hook, which makes it very painful to remove. Even worse is when the barbs are pulled out of you with force or if the ray takes off. That may have happened with Steves. If the ray took off, it probably did the damage which may have killed him within minutes or shorter.
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