Texas woman seriously injured after hawk drops snake on her and both attack

The snake wrapped itself around Peggy Jones’ arm and tried to bite her, before the bird of prey swooped down and gored her
Peggy Jones’ arm is bandaged up a fortnight on from the freak incident
Facebook/ES composite

A Texas woman has been seriously injured after a hawk dropped a snake on her, and she was attacked by both animals at the same time.

Peggy Jones, 64, had been mowing the lawn in her back garden on July 25 when a snake fell from the sky and wrapped itself around her arm and began attacking her as she tried desperately to shake it off.

“I assumed there was hawk carrying it because I was not anywhere near a tree,” Mrs Jones, who had seen hawks picks up snakes before, told CBS News.

Mrs Jones’ arm was gored by the hawk’s talons
Click2Houston

“The snake was striking in my face, it struck my glasses a couple of times. I was slinging and slinging [my arm], he was striking and striking, and he just kept hanging on.”

Mrs Jones tried to shout to her husband, who was in the front garden, for help.

“Then the hawk appeared just as fast as the snake appeared,” she said.

The powerful bird of prey began attacking the snake, mauling Mrs Jones in the process.

Mrs Jones at her home in rural Texas
Facebook

“The hawk grabbed the snake that was wrapped around my arm and pulled it like he was going to carry it away. And when he did, it flung my arm up. The hawk was carrying my arm and the snake with it.”

The bird of prey reportedly swooped on Mrs Jones several times in a bid to pull the snake from her arms, ripping her limb with its talons.

“I thought, ‘I can’t get rid of this... I’m going to die right here,” she told CBS.

The hawk eventually succeeded in carrying away the snake and Mrs Jones ran to her husband, who struggled to understand the bizarre series of events she recounted to him.

He took her to hospital, where medics treated her wounds and prescribed antibiotics.

The type of snake involved in the incident, and whether it was venomous, is not clear. It is not thought to have succeeded in biting Mrs Jones, though her glasses were dented by its attempts to strike her face.

“There were puncture wounds, cuts, abrasions, scratches and severe bruising,” Mrs Jones told CBS.

A fortnight on from her traumatic ordeal, she is still struggling to sleep. “I’ve probably gotten seven or eight hours total in the last two weeks,” she said.

Texas is home to a number of species of hawk and snake.

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