Black Mamba makes himself at home in vehicle
A two hour struggle to remove a black mamba from the engine of bakkie took place in Lions Rock on Tuesday morning.
Jo-Anne Cremer was working in her garden when security members driving past her house alerted her that there was a snake on the concrete paving in her yard. The men spotted the snake moving towards Cremer’s bakkie parked on the paving.
She rushed to secure her dogs safely in the house and saw the large black snake moving underneath the bakkie with its head reaching up to the engine compartment.
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When she returned, the snake was completely curled up in the engine. The security called for back up and a snake catching team quickly arrived on the scene.
They advised Cremer to drive the vehicle out of the yard and onto the driveway. The men struggled to catch the snake. They asked her to drive a few metres with the hope that the snake would try to escape.
“I could hear him moving around in the engine compartment and I was so scared he would stick his head out and bite me,” recalled Cremer.
After using pepper spray and other remedies, the mamba made it clear that he was not moving. It was only two hours later that the snake stuck his head out and they were able to finally get a hold of him. Unfortunately a large piece of its tail was cut off during the rescue process.
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Cremer suspects that the fan of the bakkie might have caused the injury.
Being a nature lover she wanted the snake to be set free, but as a result of its injuries the snake handlers decided to euthanise him.
The mamba was well over a metre long.
Cremer said she recalled the garage alarm often going off at night. She even put out rat poison thinking that mice could be the cause of the disturbance, but now she thinks the culprit may have been the mamba slithering over the wooden beams of the roof at night, feasting on the rodents.
