Woman killed by 10ft alligator as she tried to save her dog from its jaws
A 10-foot alligator has mauled to death an 85-year-old woman as she attempted to save her dog from a Florida pond.
The pensioner, who has not yet been named, had been walking her dog by the pond at the Spanish Lakes Fairways community in Fort Pierce on Monday, February 20, when the 700lb alligator launched itself from the water and grabbed the canine.
An eyewitness to CBS News said that the woman tried to rescue the dog from the jaws of the alligator when the 700-pound reptile attacked her. She dragged her into the pond.
The victim’s body was later recovered by officials, while her dog is being treated for injuries.
Later, they managed to drag the alligator across the grass and put it in a truck.
‘’Snagged him [the alligator] on the bottom. He never surfaced. He stayed down the whole time. Got a second hook in him and then a hard line in him so we could get him up,’ Robert Lilly, an alligator trapper working for the FWC, told WPBF.
Lilly said it was ‘definitely a fight’ as the alligator weighed around 700lb.
The pensioner is the third person to be killed by an alligator in Florida since last July.