Python hunter rescues 4-foot alligator from the grip of a 10-foot python

Professional python trapper Mike Kimmel was driving through Everglades National Park on Saturday with his friend, Jack Hubbard, when they came across a python in the bushes.

When Kimmel approached, he realized the python was wrapped around an alligator, trying to suffocate it before eating it.

While Hubbard was recording, Kimmel grabbed the 10-foot python by its head and the tail of the four-foot-long gator to drag it back towards the road. As he got to the road, the python loosened its grip on the gator, letting it free.

As the gator moved away to safety back into the Everglades, Kimmel and Hubbard worked to carefully coax the python into a trapping bag.

As a state-contracted python hunter for South Florida Water Management District, Kimmel has removed over 1,070 pythons from the Everglades. This was his third time rescuing an alligator from the killer grip of a python in the last year.

Kimmel, who has spent his whole life trapping pythons, told ABC News that “People don’t know about the war we are fighting every day in the Everglades to try and contain the spread of pythons and give our native wildlife a chance to bounce back.”

He said he catches two to six pythons a night, and that wildlife in the Everglades is in serious trouble.