Australian man escapes crocodile by cutting valuable jaws off his head

A ‘strikingly happy’ Australian man who forced a crocodile off his head by opening his jaws with his bare hands managed to escape with minor injuries, paramedics said.

© From Queensland Environment / Twitter
The Queensland area on the scene.

The 44-year-old Queensland man fought the animal Thursday while swimming at Lake Placid, near Cairns.

He had puncture wounds on either side of his face, but he was “very, very calm” when health workers showed up to treat him.

“A crocodile bit his head and in his attempt to remove the jaws of the crocodile, he stuck his hands in trying to pull the jaws apart,” paramedic Paul Sweeney told reporters. “In the process of trying to remove his hands, the jaws clap on his index finger. He is a strikingly happy gentleman.”

“Only a few inches lower and we have large blood vessels … if one of them had been pierced, it would have been a very different story,” Sweeney said.

According to him, the unnamed man estimates that the saltwater crocodile was between one and a half and two meters (4.92 feet to 6.56 feet) long.

Sweeney said the man swam in the area three times a week for about eight years. “Certainly not a place I would want to swim,” Sweeney said, describing him as a “very fit individual” and saying “his vital signs were remarkably calm when you consider the ordeal he went through.”

“I would not be surprised if he ventured into the waters again for further practice,” Sweeney added.

The Department of Environmental Affairs in Queensland has sent a team to the site and said a search for the crocodile responsible for the attack is now underway.

“Once rangers are on site, any crocodile present will be targeted for removal,” they said.

Crocodile attacks in Australia are rare, but Queensland officials are conducting a public safety campaign to alert residents to the risks of swimming or relaxing near crocodile waters.

In 2019, a Queensland fisherman escaped an attack by stabbing a crocodile in the eye. Last year, a massive 14-foot crocodile was caught at a tourist spot in the neighboring Northern Territory.