{"id":804284,"date":"2026-07-16T16:18:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T16:18:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/804284\/"},"modified":"2026-07-16T16:18:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T16:18:15","slug":"two-metre-long-snake-bites-cyclist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/804284\/","title":{"rendered":"Two metre-long snake bites cyclist"},"content":{"rendered":"

A woman has been rushed to hospital when an eastern brown snake became entangled in her bike chain and bit her on the thigh.<\/p>\n

The woman was riding along the Northern Rivers Rail Trail near Burringbar, about 33km northwest of Byron Bay, when she ran over a 2m eastern brown snake about 1pm on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

NSW Ambulance rushed to the scene and transported the woman to the Tweed Valley Hospital.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The woman was riding a bike along the Northern Rivers Rail Trail near Burringbar when she was bitten by an eastern brown snake. Picture: Supplied\/NRRT<\/p>\n

The Tweed Valley Wildlife Carers phoned venomous snake rescuer Sarah Mailey from I’ll Catch It Snake Relocations to help remove one of the world’s most venomous snakes from the bike.<\/p>\n

Ms Mailey met police who escorted her to the bike where she saw the injured snake tangled up in the chain.<\/p>\n

“I believe (the woman) rode over the snake, and the snake, as it got hit sort of flung up and got caught in a chain and bit her,” Ms Mailey said.<\/p>\n

Police and bystanders assisted the snake rescuer so she could untangle the highly venomous snake from the bike chain.<\/p>\n

“Once they could help me untangle it I had to contain the snake, put it in a bag, take it away, and unfortunately euthanise it due to the extent of the injuries,” she said.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

A woman in her 60s riding a bike along the Northern Rivers Rail Trail has been bitten by an eastern brown snake. Picture: Facebook\/I’ll Catch It Snake Relocations<\/p>\n

“It wasn’t a difficult one, it was more just dangerous because I had to contain the head, I couldn’t exactly untangle the snake.<\/p>\n

“If it wasn’t for the members of the public and the police being brave enough to assist, I would have had to hold the snake and wait for someone else to come and assist.”<\/p>\n

Ms Mailey said while snakes slowed down during winter, it was not uncommon for them to be moving around.<\/p>\n

She said they found a space to spend winter in April and May then stayed there unless it warmed up during winter.<\/p>\n

“If it warms up enough it gives them a false sense of security that it’s warm outside so they’ll bring themselves out,” she said.<\/p>\n

“They might stay out for half an hour, and they might go a couple of meters just trying to temperature regulate.<\/p>\n

“Once they realise they’re not getting that warmth that they need, they just go straight back into their chosen spot, and then they stay there until August, September.”<\/p>\n

\"I'll<\/p>\n

I’ll Catch It Snake Relocations rescuer Sarah Mailey said people should alway carry a compression bandage when they go bushwalking or riding on trails and know snake bite first aid. Picture: Tweed Tourism Co<\/p>\n

She said unfortunately in this incident the snake was run over by accident and it was probably sitting close to the side of the track.<\/p>\n

“They’ll curl up and won’t move a muscle, from a distance it could definitely be mistaken for a tree or a branch or a leaf or even a shadow,” she said.<\/p>\n

The snake rescuer advised people going out on trails or bushwalking to take a compression bandage and know snake bite first aid in case they or someone else are bitten.<\/p>\n

“Eastern browns are definitely are one of the snakes that do cause the most bites, I don’t believe that they’re an aggressive species, I just believe that they’re defensive when they’re feeling threatened,” she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A woman has been rushed to hospital when an eastern brown snake became entangled in her bike chain…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":804285,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[64,63,86209,40798,377369,128,115761,338],"class_list":["post-804284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-eastern-brown-snake","tag-northern-rivers","tag-sarah-mailey","tag-science","tag-venomous-snake","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804284","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=804284"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804284\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/804285"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=804284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=804284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=804284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}