Tuesday morning, authorities in Texas discovered what they suspect to be the body of a missing woman—in the jaws of an alligator.
The horrific image was discovered at about 8:40 a.m. as Houston police were conducting a search near Horsepen Bayou in Clear Lake for a lady who had been reported missing.
In order to prevent the gator from further harming the woman’s remains, one of the officers shot and killed it while it was devouring her corpse, according to the department.
After that, a diving crew pulled the alligator and its carcass out of the bayou.
A cause of death will be confirmed during an autopsy, and the victim’s name has not been released yet, according to the police.
Her husband last saw her at about 7:30 p.m. on Monday, when she went for a stroll, and he reported her missing first thing in the morning on Tuesday. No one ever saw her again.
She was found in the alligator’s mouth near her home on Brook Forest Drive, close to Coastal Oak Drive.
Whether the alligator actually killed the person is still unknown.
The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s Law Enforcement Division reported that game wardens from Texas helped with the cleanup.
A 28-year-old man drowned in Orange’s Adams Bayou in 2015, the latest known fatal alligator attack in Texas, according to officials.
More than 90 years had passed since the last deadly alligator attack, according to reports.
Last September, a 14-foot gator was seen strolling along a residential neighborhood in Florida with a lifeless person inside its mouth, a situation reminiscent of the current tragedy.
The beast was shot many times after officers rescued it from a canal it had entered while it still had its body clutched in its jaws.
Sabrina Peckham, a 41-year-old mother from Florida who was living in a forested area near the marshy canal when she died, was eventually recognized as the remains.