Venezuelan python leaks secret snake plan: kill humans

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Get used to this sight: it'll make your last moments easier.
Get used to this sight: it'll make your last moments easier.
Courtesy chylinski marcin
Decades of the careful planning and strategic positioning of snakes across the world may have been laid to waste by the actions of one overeager python.

Twenty-nine year old biology student Erick Arrieta was killed and partially eaten by a 10-foot Burmese python at a zoo in Caracas, Venezuela. Working the night shift alone in the reptile section of the zoo on Saturday, Arrieta, for reasons that remain unclear, broke zoo regulations and entered the cage holding the python.

The next time Arrieta was scene, he was dead and wearing a snake over his face, so the details of the attack are not known. However, I think we can make some assumptions of just what happened on Saturday.

“Snake,” probably said Arrieta, “You’re the only one I can talk to. I hate biology, but I love snakes. What am I to do?” Arrieta then very likely proceeded to subject the python to the unfortunate details of his love life, academic career, and personal ailments. The snake, I imagine, endured this as long as it could, the details of its assignment running through its eager brain all the while. But when Arrieta mentioned that “nice guys finish last,” the snake could no longer restrain itself.

“Ha ha!” said the snake, and sprang into action, latching on to Erick’s arm with dozens of needle sharp, inward-curving teeth.

“Oh no!” thought Erick, but was unable to utter the words, as the snake had already begun to wrap around the man’s chest and neck. Instead of straight out squeezing Arrieta into jerky, the python, in the way of all constrictors, would have slowly asphyxiated the student, tightening its coils as the man struggled or exhaled, until it had fully wrapped itself around its suffocating victim.

When Arrieta finally gave up the ghost, the snake did its best to hide the evidence. Starting with the head.

This is how the other zoo employees found their colleague in the morning—with his head inside a snake. The python was then beaten until it released the body.

With these events, phases one through three of an ambitious and clandestine serpentine plan have been unveiled to humans. Phase one: get close. Phase two: attack! Phase three: eat.

The fourth and final stage is now all too clear: digest. I only hope that Arrieta’s brave sacrifice was not too late.

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Your Comments, Thoughts, Questions, Ideas

<em>chylinski marcin</em>'s picture

Hello, Good story, Thanks for using mine photo. I have no other way of communicating so I'm writing here: Please correct mine name under the photo to "chylinski marcin" not "chylunski marcin"

thanks
Marcin Chylinski

posted on Sun, 09/07/2008 - 5:38pm
<em>JGordon</em>'s picture
JGordon says:

Check it out: A German Python has just let slip that it's in on the people-eating plan too.

A twelve-foot-long python in a German zoo decided to move the operation into phases two and three last week as a zoo keeper was cleaning out its cage. Apparently it decided to forgo any constricting and get right down to eating—its first lunge allowed it to engulf the zoo keeper's entire face in its mouth.

Fortunately, the zoo staff knows a couple of python deflection techniques: stick your thumbs into the snake's jawbone, and spray the sucker down with water. I guess that's supposed to be uncomfortable and confusing. But it worked, and now the snake is back to eating rats and things.

posted on Tue, 10/07/2008 - 10:27am

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