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By Pandora Dewan
Senior Science Reporter
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A two-year-old Pomeranian has narrowly escaped the jaws of an 11-foot carpet python at a dog beach in Australia. The dog, named Ferrari, was rescued by its owner Amanda Taylor in the second incident of its kind in the area this week.
The incident took place at the Noosa Wood dog beach in Queensland. Taylor was walking her three dogs—Ferrari, another Pomeranian, and a Bull Arab Mastiff cross—when she heard a painful yelp behind her.
"I looked down and I just couldn't believe my eyes," she told ABC News. "This snake had ... just grabbed my little dog on the head ... and then just wrapped around him really quickly."
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Without a moment's hesitation, Taylor grabbed the snake by the tail and started shaking it frantically. "All of a sudden [the snake] started unraveling and the poor dog went flying up in the air and running off down the beach. It was just unbelievable how fast it happened ... it was like an alien movie."
At first, onlookers thought Taylor was just holding a big stick. It was only when she shouted out for help that they saw what had happened.
Kristy Lee Williamson, who witnessed the attack, told ABC News that she grabbed a stick to help wrestle the snake off the poor dog. But by then, Taylor had the situation under control.
"She acted so quickly," Williamson said. "I would hate to think what might have happened had it been just like a few seconds longer ... it just felt like she really nailed that situation and saved her dog—she was like Steve Irwin."
Taylor said after the python had let go of her dog, she hurled it back towards the river. She then picked up Ferrari and wrapped him in a towel. He was bleeding from the head from two bite wounds (on his ear and below his eye) and is now recovering on antibiotics.
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Carpet pythons are common across mainland Australia. They are non-venomous ambush predators that kill their prey by constriction. The snakes are usually harmless, but they have been known to prey on family pets.
Earlier this week, a similar incident took place a stone's throw away from the dog beach. Nadia Hackling was in her home at Boreen Point in the Noosa region when she heard her nine-week-old kitten, Boots, screaming.
"I walked downstairs and there was Boots with a three-meter python wrapped around him," she told ABC News.
Hackling said she had to hold the python's head down with a shovel while she unraveled her kitten from its grip.
Boots has since made a full recovery.
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