Alligator attacks, kills woman canoeing
with her husband on lake in Florida: "He
tried to fight the gator off"
CBS News,
by
John MacLauchlan
Original Article
Posted By: Hazymac,
5/8/2025 8:20:22 AM
An alligator attacked and killed a woman who was canoeing with her husband on a central Florida lake Tuesday afternoon, authorities said, after her spouse tried unsuccessfuly to fight off the predator.
The attack occurred near the mouth of Tiger Creek into Lake Kissimmee, south of Orlando, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission said. It's near the same location as a March alligator attack in which a woman was bitten on the elbow while kayaking.
At a news conference Wednesday, FWC Maj. Evan Laskowski said the woman was sitting in the bow of a 14-foot canoe when the attack happened. She and her husband were in about 2.5 feet
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Reply 1 - Posted by:
Hazymac 5/8/2025 8:31:51 AM (No. 1946857)
Canoeing is not a good idea where alligators are about. These reptiles can be found in or near any body of water in Florida, even in swimming pools. In the last twenty-four hours, wildlife authorities have culled two gators, ten to eleven feet, from the area near the mouth of Tiger Creek, so they probably got the one that killed the woman. If you're planning to be in any body of water in Florida, take a boat that a gator can't capsize. Canoes are fine in Tennessee, where I used to teach other Scouts the fine points of keeping the canoe straight. We didn't have to worry about alligators.
I used to go bass fishing on Lake Kissimmee with other professional golfers. There are plenty of gators there. We would not enter the water! Incidentally, Lake Kissimmee is a place where many bald eagles gather. Quite a sight when a dozen of these magnificent birds are visible at once.
19 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
halfnorsk 5/8/2025 8:54:07 AM (No. 1946868)
Here in Minnesota we have no alligators. But we have Tampon Timmy. I'm not sure which is worse.
26 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
red1066 5/8/2025 8:54:10 AM (No. 1946869)
Didn't a gator kill a kid in the Disney complex while he was swimming a number of years ago? When I'm in Florida, I NEVER go near the shore of a lake or pond. I've seen people swimming in a canal and twenty feet away is a gator. I was in the Tampa area a few years ago and visited a park with alligators that were over ten feet long and people were walking within eight or ten feet of them. Either they didn't see them, or they were just plain stupid.
13 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
Bur Oak 5/8/2025 8:57:56 AM (No. 1946871)
I saw a video by a woman in Louisiana about how to tell if there were alligators. If there's water, there are alligators.
20 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
cor-vet 5/8/2025 9:08:37 AM (No. 1946875)
FAFO!
7 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
planetgeo 5/8/2025 9:09:30 AM (No. 1946877)
People in Florida seem to take an absurdly casual view regarding the dangers of alligators. It's like they think they're in a Disney movie and all the animals will sing cheerful little songs when they encounter them. Well, zip-a-dee-do...dAARRRHHHHHG...
14 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
Robert D 5/8/2025 9:30:46 AM (No. 1946885)
At first, I thought this might be a case of a husband/wife hunting "accident" but checked and it is early alligator mating season in Florida when alligators are apparently very aggressive. Not a good time to be in a small boat.
9 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
Strike3 5/8/2025 9:36:21 AM (No. 1946889)
I remember a few years back when a high school girl was on a running trail near Orlando and was run down and attacked by a gator. We share their territory but they are the bosses and do what comes naturally when they are hungry.
8 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
FLCracker 5/8/2025 9:40:12 AM (No. 1946890)
No, #3.
It was a nursery-school-aged kid walking with his parents on the undeveloped, unlighted edge of a lake about 9:30 at night. As I remember, the kid was several feet from the parents when the attack happened.
It's the edges of bodies of water that really seem to be the problem. That's where alligators and crocodiles (we have them, too, in FL) lurk in the water, waiting for something edible to come by for a drink.
7 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
Hazymac 5/8/2025 10:16:34 AM (No. 1946910)
Several years ago, just after dark on the Atlantic coast south of Daytona, a burglar was trying back doors in a middle class neighborhood. Several residents heard or saw him, and called the police. Seeing the blue lights and officers walking around with flashlights, the burglar tried hiding in the one place they wouldn't find him: in a lake with low hanging tree branches above. The cops poked around for twenty or thirty minutes before calling off the search. Two days later, whatever parts of the hamburglar that the alligator had not eaten were located lodged under a log and stinking. Well, he escaped arrest, didn't he? Saved himself at least a night in jail. Priorities, priorities. He must have had warrants. The lucky alligator, found with human remains in his belly, was an 11-footer. On dry land, a person can probably outrun an alligator. In water, a human being has no chance against a sizable gator. No chance at all.
10 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
downnout 5/8/2025 10:27:05 AM (No. 1946917)
In Florida it’s always a good idea to assume there are gators in every waterhole and lake. I can’t believe some of the stupidity I’ve witnessed of people standing only a foot or two from the water. They may as well tie chicken necks to their ankles to attract the critters.
4 people like this.
Reply 12 - Posted by:
Mizz Fixxit 5/8/2025 10:29:26 AM (No. 1946921)
Regarding Poster 10. I was told alligators can run pretty fast in a straight line only.
4 people like this.
Reply 13 - Posted by:
jdano 5/8/2025 10:53:28 AM (No. 1946937)
Was it mentioned what bait the husband used? 😜
3 people like this.
Reply 14 - Posted by:
danu 5/8/2025 10:54:45 AM (No. 1946939)
they are not just in the water. they slither into your kitchen, and onto your golf course.
5 people like this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
Lucky5 5/8/2025 11:06:05 AM (No. 1946943)
That is horrible. RIP
6 people like this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
Msquared112 5/8/2025 11:27:20 AM (No. 1946959)
I'm not blaming the victims here but you have to scrupulously avoid alligator spots (water), especially during mating season where to an alligator guy, if it moves, you screw it. Or eat it.
5 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
Sunhan65 5/8/2025 12:13:05 PM (No. 1946985)
When I was at University of Florida, I would often see students eating lunch perhaps 15 ft from the island in Lake Alice where gators sat sunning. One day, I even saw a student eating with his back to the alligators.
As part of a safety briefing, they showed us footage of a gator running and then climbing a fence. They are fast when they want to be.
7 people like this.
Reply 18 - Posted by:
Phantomll 5/8/2025 12:19:01 PM (No. 1946989)
I've done a lot of canoeing on the canoe trails in the Okefenokee Swamp and never had a problem with the gators.
3 people like this.
Reply 19 - Posted by:
DVC 5/8/2025 4:07:50 PM (No. 1947088)
About 25 or 230 years ago my wife and I were canoeing on Alexander River, which starts at Alexander Spring a large spring in Ocala National Forest in N Central Florida. There had been a lot of rain recently and water was flowing heavily out of the swampy forest lands adjacent to the river. The crystal clear spring water was gradually squeezed out by the dark tannic stained side flow water. The water was high, out of the normal banks, into the forest a bit. We go ahead of our friends and pulled into a small side section in the flooded trees, out of the current to wait.
We didn't really notice on a conscious level a large log floating on our right as we coasted into the backwater, about 4 feet off to the side of the log, about as long as the 17 foot canoe. As we slid up, looking left, log on our right......KAPLOOOSH! and giant "hole in the water" appeared where the 'log' had been as a giant sleeping gator suddenly awoke and did a "crash dive". We both instantly realized what that 'log' in our peripheral vision had been and pulled out paddles out of the water and said rapidly, "oh, crap, oh, crap" hoping that he wouldn't dump the canoe. The ripples died down and that was the end of that...than goodness.
About 8 years later a guy swimming in Alexander Spring area was taken by a gator and killed.
Ya'll be careful out there, and the gators are all getting BIGGER as they age. And the never die of old age, apparently....to primitive a dinosaur to have 'invented' aging.
2 people like this.
Reply 20 - Posted by:
DVC 5/8/2025 4:11:33 PM (No. 1947089)
Re #17, I used to watch people feeding gators marshmallows (somehow, they love them) in Lake Alice. I once saw one run about100 yds across dry land, faster than any human can run. to slide into place to get his marshmallows....running past the people tossing the marshmallows about 25 ft to their side.
2 people like this.
Reply 21 - Posted by:
DVC 5/8/2025 4:12:52 PM (No. 1947090)
Correction to #19.....25 or 30 years ago......I'm old but not THAT old. LOL!
3 people like this.
Reply 22 - Posted by:
IceQueen 5/9/2025 3:50:17 AM (No. 1947302)
B'H
(In)San(e) Diego transplant to East Tennessee here. (20 years in TN)
I cannot, for the life of me, understand why alligators are a protected species in Florida. I've watched the "Swamp People" series, seen videos and heard stories of alligators harassing (on someone's porch, meandering down a residential street) and snatching people (children and adults) and pets for lunch/dinner. Those creatures can run PDQ on land and just forget surviving a water attack.
Why do the lives of these creatures have precedence over human beings (and dear pets)?
0 people like this.
Reply 23 - Posted by:
FLCracker 5/9/2025 12:23:44 PM (No. 1947557)
#21, Not to worry, we took the years as hyperbole.
#22, When I was a kid, the Florida alligator was on the endangered species list. Alligator shoes, bags, baggage and belts need to become a thing again. This is how humans stay on top of the food pyramid.
0 people like this.
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