This is not the first time the combination of public transportation and a sack of Gaboon vipers has come to an entirely predictable bad end. In 1983, a sixteen-year-old amateur herpetologist named Louis Morton broke the glass of a reptile-house display case at the National Zoo, stuffed two Gaboon vipers in a plastic grocery bag, and hopped on a bus with the bag slung over his shoulder. Now, as you might already know, venomous snakes can bite through flimsy plastic bags, and that’s exactly what happened to Morton. As soon as the poor teenager started screaming that he was about to die, the bus driver quickly rerouted herself to the D.C. Children’s Hospital, where antivenin was administered.
I’m a little disappointed in humanity that no-vipers-on-the-bus is a lesson we needed to learn more than once.
2 comments:
I was living in DC when that happened. The kid was actually getting off the bus at a stop when the snake bit him on the top of the shoulder. He screamed & dropped the bag & the Gaboon viper crawled out on the sidewalk. I only remember one viper, but he could have taken two.
There was a flurry of activity to get the kid to the hospital & the cops had to find someone to round up the snake.
The viper's venom, btw, has some digestive enzymes in it and the young man lost some muscle tissue on his should & back. I think that was the last time he stole a snake.
It's just so sad to know what people can do for money. I don't know if I will call Morton and that Zimbabwean courageous or *whatever*. We all know that Gaboon Vipers are indeed venomous and deadly! Source: venomoussnakes.net/gaboon.htm
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