Snakes Alive
Bob McNally 11.02.16
A man who stopped along South Florida’s Alligator Alley to catch a glimpse of the area’s famous reptiles was air-lifted to an emergency care unit after he stepped on a cottonmouth water moccasin snake he didn’t see. Broward Sheriff Fire Rescue spokesman Mike Jachles said the 29-year-old from Boynton Beach was bitten on the foot by the snake one evening after he and his girlfriend stopped their car and got out to watch an alligator, apparently oblivious to the reptile near their feet.
In Rowan County, North Carolina, 82-year-old William Litaker spotted a couple poisonous copperhead snakes behind a mobile home he used as storage. To rid the danger posed by the snakes, he thought he’d “smoke ’em out.” But when his kerosene-induced smoke-snake-control-system destroyed a barn, two sheds, and the mobile home containing collectibles and antiques, he was reflective. “I thought now would be a good time to do it [smoke ’em], but it wasn’t,” he said.
