A nearly 18-pound king cobra was spotted winding its way around the bars outside apartment windows in southwestern China, bringing the venomous snake right up to residents’ homes.<\/p>\n
Here’s what to know<\/p>\n
The snake reportedly emerged from a nearby hill in Liupanshui, according to BroBible<\/a>. The cobra was not thought to have been kept as a pet.<\/p>\n Metal bars guarded the building’s windows, and the footage captured the cobra threading around those barriers. TMZ shared the video on social media, crediting Marija Stojkoska\/NEWSFLASH for the footage.<\/p>\n Residents reported no harmful contact with the cobra.<\/p>\n More background<\/p>\n King cobras can grow to 18 feet long, and the largest specimens weigh more than 20 pounds.<\/p>\n Despite the hood and the name, king cobras aren’t true cobras. They belong to their own genus, Ophiophagus.<\/p>\n Encounters like this one are often tied to habitat loss. Urban expansion and development can push animals out of their natural habitat and closer to people, making run-ins like this more likely.<\/p>\n “Talk about a nightmare neighbor \u2026 residents of an apartment building in China got the scare of a lifetime when a massive, nearly 18-pound king cobra came slithering right past their windows \u2026 and it’s all on video,” TMZ wrote<\/a>.<\/p>\n Where can I learn more?<\/p>\n Residents elsewhere in Asia have also found king cobras close to home. These stories cover cobras found in homes across the region and an unusual nesting discovery in China.<\/p>\n \u2022 In Thailand, a nearly five-meter black king cobra appeared<\/a> inside a home during rainy weather.<\/p>\n \u2022 In Bali, 18 king cobras were removed<\/a> from homes in three months.<\/p>\n \u2022 In China’s Yunnan province, two king cobras guarded<\/a> a nest containing 72 eggs.<\/p>\n \u2022 In Bihar, a king cobra confronted<\/a> a python inside a family’s home compound.<\/p>\n \u2022 In the Philippines, a homeowner found a juvenile Luzon king cobra<\/a> indoors.<\/p>\n Get TCD’s free newsletters<\/a> for easy tips, smart advice, and a chance to earn $5,000 toward home upgrades. To see more stories like this one, change your Google preferences here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A nearly 18-pound king cobra was spotted winding its way around the bars outside apartment windows in southwestern…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":678835,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[61,60,82,263],"class_list":["post-678834","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-science","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678834","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=678834"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678834\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/678835"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=678834"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=678834"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=678834"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}