Woman goes to work, gets swallowed whole by 22-foot python

[iemanja]

11. The article sites experts

Snake conservationist Nathan Rusli, director of the Indonesia Herpetofauna Foundation, suspects a reticulated python was likely responsible. The species is the only reptile living in the Sumatran province of Jambi that is large enough to have consumed an adult human, he told The Washington Post.

“They are constrictors, so what they do is coil their body around you. They will give you a hug of death. You breathe in and your body gets smaller, it tightens its grip, and you can’t breathe out,” Rusli explained. “The top and bottom jaw of a snake is connected by ligaments, it’s quite flexible. They can swallow prey larger than the size of their head.”

Confirmed reports like these are relatively rare, occurring around once a year.

“Most cases are cases of farmers working in rubber and cacao plantations in Sumatra and Sulawesi, most cases occurs at night,” Indonesian snake expert Djoko Iskandar, a professor at Bandung Institute of Technology, told The Post. Only extremely long reptiles are able to successfully hunt adult humans, with the smallest Indonesian python known to have been involved in a fatal encounter still measuring over 18 feet long, Iskandar said.