After going missing, a 25-year-old Indonesian man was found in the body a reticulated python — one of the largest snake species in the world.
To all those Ophidiophobian (those with an abnormal fear of snakes), this story is without a doubt a real-life version of your biggest nightmare.
The Daily Mail reported that Akbar Salubiro went missing and after a couple of days and was found dead inside the body of a python.
Salubiro lived in a village on the island of West Sulawesi, Indonesia, with his wife and two kids.
The young father left to harvest palm oil one day, but didn’t make it past his back garden, where a reticulated python had grabbed hold of him, suffocated him and slowly swallowed the man’s body whole.
According to Elite Daily, Salubiro Junaidi, the village secretary, said, “People had heard cries from the palm grove the night before Akbar was found in the snake’s stomach.”
With his wife away, it was friends and family members who noticed that Salubiro was missing and began the search.
They quickly found the swollen, massive python in the missing man’s backyard and noticed a bulge in the serpent’s stomach that, terrifyingly, matched the shape of boots.
They took it upon themselves to confirm their suspicions.
Using an 18-inch long hunting knife, locals cut open the animal’s huge torso to find their friend’s lifeless body.
Images show that Salubiro was, in fact, still wearing his boots, along with his shorts and T-shirt.
His wife had not yet returned to the village — nor had she heard the news from friends and family of her husband’s death — when she saw the images, videos and stories of the grotesque find swarming the internet.
According to the Animal Diversity Web, the specific type of snake is comes from southeastern Asia and western Bangladesh to south eastern Vietnam and on the Indo-Pacific islands west of New Guinea. But reports have recently concluded that the reticulated python has been spotted in southern Florida, Queensland, Australia and South Sudan.
Its average length is 15.68 feet and its average weight is 374.79 pounds, although some females can get quite a bit larger and heavier.
They don’t produce venom and nor do they bite. Like most large snakes, they kill their prey by wrapping around and suffocating it. They primarily hunt birds and mammals of all sizes.
Reticulated pythons are one of the most commonly hunted snakes by humans due to their large size, which guarantees a large quantity of snakeskin that can be sold.