Boy, 9, fights off huge alligator, escapes with minor injuries
Now this is a story to tell the grandkids.
James Barney Junior, who is just 9, was riding on his bike before he decided to take a dip in a lake.
Mere seconds later, he felt something brush up against his leg, said James who was speaking to reporters from his ward at an Orlando hospital.
"At first, I thought someone was just playing with me and I didn't know what happened," said James as he clutched a teddy bear.
He then reached out to grab it when he "felt its jaw" and realised it was an alligator.
James said: "I felt its teeth and I didn't know what to do, so I immediately reacted and hit it a couple of time. So, then it was letting go a little and then finally I had enough strength left to pry its jaw open a little."
But the alligator, which was 2.7 metres, managed to bite the boy three times.
He then quickly swan back to shore.
Witnesses say the boy surfaced, screaming that he'd been bitten by an alligator.
A 911 caller described the scene following the attack.
“We heard him screaming, and then we didn’t know what happened, so we decided to go over there and there was a big alligator actually 5 feet (1.5m) away from him. He was crawling up the shore screaming, and crying with gator bites all over his back and scratches,” the caller said.
The reptile still remains on the loose although the authorities have since closed that part of the lake.
Doctors found a tooth in the back of James, who knows exactly what to do with it.
James said: "I want to put it on a necklace so that I can tell all my friends."
Source: ABC News, Daily Mail
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