A father saved his 11-year-old son from an alligator attack during a family vacation in Florida. The boy was attempting to throw a fish back into the water at a camp near Umatilla in Marion County when a gator latched onto his arm. While the child lost his right hand as a result of the attack, his life was fortunately spared.
A GoFundMe has been set up in support of the child
The child, Brodie Terry, and his family who were visiting from Pennsylvania was in the middle of a fishing trip on June 27 at the Nelson Fish Camp when the alligator struck, according to reports from News 6 and WESH 2.
A family relative, Andrew Wright, shared that the family was aware of the alligators at the site. “They did see alligators in the area,” he said. “Nothing that was close to them at all, and nothing that was of concern to them.”
But when Brodie hurled a fish back into the water, the gator “came out of nowhere” and bit him, prompting his father to rush into action.
Another family member, Andrew Raines, recalls that “Brodie’s father jumped into the water on top of it and tried to pry his mouth open.”
However, Wright says the gator’s roll “broke pretty much every bone in Brodie’s lower arm, severing part of his hand.”
Doctors attempted to perform several surgeries to save the child’s dominant hand but had to amputate it at the wrist.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission states that an officer was able to locate and kill the nearly 9-foot alligator involved in the attack. The FWC warns people to be on alert around the water’s edge and never to feed alligators, especially during the warmer months.
A GoFundMe to assist in the child’s recovery and the family’s medical expenses has raised more than $27,000, as of July 8. The organizer of GoFundMe said on July 7 that Brodie is safe and that “his spirits have lifted a bit since leaving the hospital especially with the overwhelming support he has received.”
