Man loses arm after gator attack behind SW Florida bar
PORT CHARLOTTE - A man lost his arm after being attacked by an alligator behind a bar in southwest Florida.
The 23-year-old man was attacked early Sunday in Port Charlotte, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.
The man had been a patron at Banditos Bar, which is located next to a pond. Another bar patron, Manny Hidalgo, told The Daily Sun that he heard the man screaming from the pond area and went outside looking for him in the early morning darkness.
"He was yelling and swimming toward the shoreline," Hidalgo said. "I ran and dragged him up onto the sand. I was scared to get close to the water because it was dark out."
"The responding crew treated a male patient who had an above the elbow amputation of his upper right extremity. Bystanders applied a tourniquet to the patient before we arrived," Charlotte County Fire & EMS spokesperson Todd Dunn said in a statement.
The man was taken by helicopter to Gulf Coast Hospital in Fort Myers.
"The gator was big enough, I think he just got a clean cut and took off with arm and left him alone, so he's lucky to be alive otherwise that dude would have probably drowned it and then been dinner for the family," said Hidalgo.
A nuisance alligator trapper removed the 10 and a half foot alligator from the property, according to wildlife officials.