Despite incredible speculation, what may be the first case of a python consuming an adult human has been confirmed.
A group of Indonesian villagers made a horrific discovery after their friend went missing.
Akbar Salubiro had disappeared for two days after leaving for work harvesting palm oil on the island of West Sulawesi, Indonesia, on Sunday night. A search party sent out Monday discovered a massive 23-foot python swollen from a recent meal. A shape clearly resembling a pair of work boots could be clearly seen pressing against the inside of the snake’s skin.
Fearing the worst, the villagers killed the python and opened its belly. Inside they found the remains of Salubiro who had been swallowed whole by the massive snake.
According to the BBC, pythons rarely kill humans and usually avoid human settlements. Although there have been reports of pythons consuming young children and house pets, it had been widely believed that a python would be incapable of swallowing a fully grown adult human due to the size of our shoulders.
A spokesperson for the West Sulawesi province named Mashura police told BBC “They didn’t find him (Akbar), but the villagers saw an unmoving python in the ditch. They grew suspicious that maybe the snake had Akbar. When they cut it open, Akbar was inside the snake.” Like many other Indonesians, Mashura only goes by a single name.
Village secretary Salubiro Junaidi told the Jakarta Post “People had heard cries from the palm grove the night before Akbar was found in the snake’s stomach. When the snake was captured, the boots Akbar was wearing were clearly visible in the stomach of the snake. Resident[s] cut open the belly of the snake and Akbar was lifeless.”
Nia Kurniawan, an expert in snake behavior from Brawijaya University, told BBC News that a python of this size would likely hunt for prey near palm oil plantations that attract boar, primates, and dogs.
WARNING: Extremely graphic content.