Alligator kills Florida woman trying to save dog from attack

An 85-year-old Florida woman died Monday while trying to save her dog from a 10-foot-long alligator.

The freak attack reportedly occurred outside Spanish Lakes Fairways, a retirement community in Fort Pierce, WPTV reported.

According to residents, the unidentified octogenarian had been walking her pet when an alligator suddenly lunged out of the water and grabbed it. The senior attempted to save her pooch, but was dragged underwater, CBS reported.

While the pup survived, the woman was not so lucky.

The victim’s body was subsequently “recovered” when an alligator wrangler was called in to trap the rogue reptile.

“It was definitely a fight,” nuisance alligator trapper Robert Lilly said, recalling the capture. “[We] snagged him on the bottom. He never surfaced. He stayed down the whole time.”


A wildlife official binds the rogue reptile.
Authorities estimated that the ravenous reptile weighed between 600 and 700 pounds.
St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office

Spanish Lakes Fairways, a retirement community near Fort Pierce in St. Lucie County.
Residents say they had never seen an alligator attack in the area before.
St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office

Officials load the gator onto a pickup truck.
The victim had been trying to save her dog from the beast.
St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office

He added, “We were able to get a second hook in him and a hard line in him so we could get him up.”

Accompanying photos and footage show six people corralling the critter, before loading it into the back of a pickup truck. Experts estimated that the beast measured around 10 to 11-feet long and weighed between 600 and 700 pounds.

The St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office has reportedly closed several roads in the area, so they can launch a probe into the woman’s death.

While gators are reportedly not an uncommon sight in the area, neighbors claimed they had never witnessed an attack like that before.


Officials drag the gator to shore.
Eyewitnesses say the gator dragged the woman underwater.
St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office

In another gator-related incident, authorities hauled a 4-foot-long alligator from Brooklyn’s Prospect Park Lake early Sunday near an area popular with kiddies.

Meghan Lalor, a rep for the Parks Department, said the reptile was likely an unwanted pet whose owner decided to release it in public waters.