A Texan gardener says she is “relieved to be alive” after being attacked by a snake that fell from the sky – and a hawk that swooped down to reclaim its prey.
Peggy Jones, 64, was mowing her lawn when the passing hawk dropped its dinner directly onto her.
The serpent quickly coiled itself around her arm and bit her repeatedly. The hawk then joined the melee, attacking Ms Jones’s arm as it tried in vain to untangle the snake.
“It (the snake) was starting to dart at my face...and he was striking my glasses and he just kept on and kept on,” she said. “ I just couldn’t get rid of the snake… I think I went into survival mode.”
Eventually, the hawk was able to pull the snake off of Ms Jones’s arm, leaving her husband to take her to the hospital.
Ms Jones said she had suffered deep bite and talon wounds, as well as smashed glasses which she said had been covered in snake venom.
“Finally he (the hawk) got the snake and took off with the snake, and I looked down and I was covered in blood, my arm was pretty torn up,” she told a local radio station.
Ms Jones said that she prayed as the pair of animals attacked her, fearing the worst.
“The snake was squeezing so hard, and I was waving my arms in the air,” she told Click2Houston.
“Then, this hawk was swooping down, clawing at my arm over and over. I just kept saying, ‘help me, Jesus, help me, Jesus’.”
The incident took place in the town of Silsbee, Texas, near the Louisiana border, on July 25.
Ms Jones said that she feels “like the luckiest person alive to have survived this”, but said she has been left traumatised.
“You try to sleep at night, you can’t sleep, and you’re afraid to shut your eyes because you know if you shut your eyes you will have a nightmare and relive the situation,” she said.
“I’m happy I’m alive. I’m happy I’m here… It showed me how in a blink of an eye things can change. I feel differently about life now.”
She said she believed the hawk had saved her life.
“I think that was God’s way of letting me live because I couldn’t figure out a way — the snake was not letting go of my arm,” she said.
Though the area is home to several species of venomous snakes, Bryan Hughes, a local snake expert, said the serpent was likely a non-venomous rat snake.
“It fell on the woman and hung onto her because this was a panicked, injured animal,” Mr Hughes told Insider. “Then the bird swept down to finish what it started.”
It was not the first time that Ms Jones had come face to face with the local snake population, however.
Ms Jones survived being bitten by a venomous snake several years ago, she said.
