‘The gator has me’: Horrifying video shows how alligator attack on 85-year-old in Florida unfolded , Latest World News - The New Paper
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‘The gator has me’: Horrifying video shows how alligator attack on 85-year-old in Florida unfolded

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MIAMI - A chilling footage of Wednesday’s horrifying alligator attack on an 85-year-old woman in the southern US state of Florida has emerged on social media.

The video showed how the 3m-long reptile silently followed her and her dog from afar before it finally surged out of the lake and lunged at the pooch called Trooper.

The dog managed to get out of harm’s way but the alligator went for Ms Gloria Serge, who was dragged into the water and mauled to death.

Her final moments at the Spanish Lakes Fairways retirement community in Fort Pierce was captured on a wildlife camera set up by Travel Birds on the property, the Inside Edition reported.

Warning: Viewer discretion is advised

An eyewitness, Ms Carole Thomas, 76, quickly called 911 as she tried to help her neighbour.

“(I) just remember her coming up and you know... getting air, and I’m saying swim towards the, swim towards the paddle boat, and she says, ‘I can’t. The gator has me,’“ the woman told local TV station WPBF.

Ms Thomas called emergency services and grabbed a pole in hopes of helping her friend, the station reported.

“I thought, well I’ll put that out in the water and hook her or hit him, and – she was not there any more.”

Helpless, Ms Thomas could only wait. “I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t get in the water.”

Trooper survived the attack but Ms Serge succumbed to her injuries. The alligator, which weighed between 270kg and 320kg, was caught and later euthanised.

Florida has a population of 1.3 million alligators across its 67 counties, and they can be found in practically all fresh water bodies and occasionally in salt water.

But the number of cases of people being attacked by alligators in the state is small.

From 1948 to 2021, 26 bites resulted in human fatalities.

Over the past 10 years, Florida has averaged eight unprovoked bites per year that are serious enough to require professional medical treatment, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

united statesanimalsUNNATURAL DEATH