69-year-old man dies after suspected brown snake bite

ABC NEWS (Australia)

A man has died in North Queensland over the weekend, after being bitten multiple times by a snake. Paramedics say the man aged in his sixties was attempting to uncoil the snake from another man's ankle when he was bitten on the chest and arm.

Transcript

00:00 A man in his 60s did die over the weekend.

00:04 He was attending the 100 year anniversary for Kamala State High School, which is a small

00:08 high school located just about an hour south of Mackay.

00:11 As you mentioned, he was there with a large number of people, including a 65 year old

00:15 man who was his friend.

00:18 Paramedics have said that during the course of the evening, a snake had coiled around

00:21 his friend's leg.

00:23 The man tried to help remove the snake, but was subsequently bitten both in the chest

00:28 and the arms.

00:29 He went into a cardiac arrest.

00:32 Paramedics worked to try to resuscitate him for about 30 minutes, but were unsuccessful.

00:37 Do we know what kind of snake it was?

00:41 So we've heard from Dr. Claire Bartenshaw from the Queensland Ambulance Service.

00:45 She says in these kind of cases, it's really difficult to identify the exact type of snake.

00:50 But at this point in time, all the symptoms are pointing to the highly venomous Eastern

00:54 Brown snake.

00:55 We've heard from experts as well that snake attacks basically kill about one to two people

01:01 every year in Australia.

01:03 And often the cause of that is these highly venomous and also quite aggressive Eastern

01:08 Brown snakes.

01:10 You mentioned it was the 100th anniversary of a local school.

01:13 What's been the community's reaction?

01:15 Yes, so look, the community is absolutely reeling.

01:20 Kamala itself, it's a population of about 800 people and they're incredibly passionate

01:24 and very, very closely knit.

01:27 We've also had a whole stream of messages coming through online, on social media, and

01:33 it's very evident that this man was well known and very well liked in the community.

01:37 Many people are calling him a hero, having saved the 65-year-old man's life.

01:42 That 65-year-old man we've heard since has been released from Mackay Base Hospital yesterday

01:47 and is expected to make a good recovery.

01:49 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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