A passenger in a car has had the fright of his life, after a tiger snake slithered across his feet during a drive on the NSW far south coast.<\/p>\n
Tanny Parsons was in the car with his friend and a pet dog in Narooma on Friday, when he felt something touch his feet.<\/p>\n
Mr Parsons, who was barefoot, initially thought it might have been a plastic bag, before realising it was actually a snake.<\/p>\n
“I felt something on my feet, I looked down and this large snake was just across my feet,” he said.<\/p>\n
“I just yelled out to my friend to stop the car, get the dog and jump out.<\/p>\n
“It gave me a hell of a fright.”Shock of your life<\/p>\n
The car had been parked in Mr Parson’s driveway in Tilba Tilba for about six weeks while he was in Victoria visiting family.<\/p>\n
The incident happened the day after he returned home, after he went grocery shopping in Narooma.<\/p>\n
Mr Parsons said it was not uncommon to see snakes on his property, and they do not bother him.<\/p>\n
But encountering one in a car was a different story.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“It was the shock of your life to see a snake in your car in such a small space where you’ve got nowhere to go,” he said.<\/p>\n
“It’s a very small space to have your feet and have a snake there.”<\/p>\n
The VRA members had to search the vehicle, and dismantle parts of it, to find the snake (Supplied: Tanny Parsons)<\/p>\n
After jumping from the car, Mr Parsons began making calls to find a snake catcher.<\/p>\n
Malcolm Barry, captain of VRA Rescue NSW in Narooma, came to his aid.<\/p>\n
He and his daughter, Sarah, who are both trained snake handlers, searched the vehicle and dismantled parts of it to find the snake.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
It took some time for the VRA to locate the snake in the vehicle (Supplied: VRA Rescue NSW Narooma)<\/p>\n
It took some time, but they eventually located the tail.<\/p>\n
“They tend to puff themselves up if they’re grabbed by the tail, and they won’t come out,” Mr Barry said.<\/p>\n
“You have to wait for them to relax and come out that way.”<\/p>\n
The VRA members used a hook to lift the snake out and put it in a bag, where they were met with a round of applause from onlookers.<\/p>\n
Mr Parsons initially thought it was a brown snake, but VRA informed him afterwards that it was actually a five-foot tiger snake.<\/p>\n
Tiger snakes are highly venomous, but are generally considered more aggressive than a brown snake in nature.<\/p>\n
Patience is key<\/p>\n
Mr Barry has relocated nearly 400 snakes in the region over the past three years.<\/p>\n
He said pythons, black, brown and tiger snakes were common in the region, especially as the weather warms up.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Captain of the Narooma VRA Rescue squad, Malcolm Barry, helped retrieve the snake. (Supplied: VRA Rescue NSW Narooma)<\/p>\n
Mr Barry commended Mr Parsons for keeping calm, given the unique situation.<\/p>\n
“He was relatively calm for someone who had a snake all over his feet while driving,” he said.<\/p>\n
“We’ve pulled snakes out of homes and hidden behind furniture, but it’s our first car.<\/p>\n
“It wasn’t a close call, there was no hint of the snake biting, it was actually a pretty easy catch.”<\/p>\n
The tiger snake has been released back into the wild (Supplied: VRA Rescue NSW Narooma)<\/p>\n
It is suspected that rats, which are a perfect food source for snakes, had made their way into the car while Mr Parsons was out of town.<\/p>\n
Mr Parsons gave the VRA a donation as a thank you for their help on the day.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The snake has since been released back into the wild at Corunna Lake.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A passenger in a car has had the fright of his life, after a tiger snake slithered across…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":224521,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[5865,23817,30169,120344,36393,43,136167,136163,44,58365,4036,136165,136164,41,39,42,40,136166],"class_list":["post-224520","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-car","tag-driving","tag-encounter","tag-feet","tag-foot","tag-headlines","tag-malcolm-barry","tag-narooma","tag-news","tag-passenger","tag-snake","tag-tanny-parsons","tag-tilba-tilba","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-vra"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224520","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=224520"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224520\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/224521"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=224520"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=224520"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=224520"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}