Kevin Murray was hiking after dark in Hopewell Township last Thursday when the scary incident unfolded, according to ABC affiliateWPVI.
While walking in the area Murray, 21, told the outlet he suddenly felt pain in his ankle and fell down. It was then that the Pennington resident spotted the slithering reptile just a few feet away, WPVI reported.
“I just felt a sharp sting right on my ankle,” Murray recalled to the local outlet. “I don’t know much about snakes. I just assumed it would be a garden snake or something that wasn’t much of a problem.”
But as Murray soon learned, the incident was more serious than what he suspected, according to WPVI.
Thinking quickly, Murray snapped a photo of the snake before rushing to the emergency room at Capital Health in Pennington, the outlet reported.
Though they are likely to bite, their venom is considered “relatively mild, and their bites are rarely fatal for humans,” the outlet reported. Copperheads are also believed to be nocturnal during the summer, especially on humid, warm nights after rain, per LiveScience.
After medical professions determined the breed of snake that bit Murray, they quickly took action, according to WPVI.
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“They brought me to the ICU to monitor my heart rate to make sure the venom wasn’t spreading to my heart,” Murray recalled to the outlet.
Luckily, the venom didn’t spread, WPVI reported. Murray also didn’t require anti-venom treatment, which can bring long-term side effects like rashes and fever, according to the outlet.
After three days in the hospital, the 21-year-old was released to go home, where he is now recovering — and counting his blessings.
“There’s no long-term side effects they think are going to happen, so I got a great story out of it,” he told the outlet.
Dr. Robert Bassett, the associate medical director for Philadelphia Poison Control, told WPVI that venomous snakes are rare around New Jersey, but that it is breeding season for snakes, which encourages more aggressive behavior from the reptiles.
“This is kind of snakebite season. We typically think of the warmer weather as being associated with more activity with snakes,” he explained to the outlet. “[The copperhead] makes up a very small percentage of the total snakes we have in the area.”
A spokesperson with the New Jersey’s Division of Fish and Wildlife echoed Bassett’s sentiments, telling WPVI that copperheads are only found in the northwestern part of New Jersey, and there have been no reported deaths in the state from that breed’s bite.
source: people.com
