A king cobra that tried to swallow a rat snake, which was trapped in a fishing net, met with the same fate.
A snake expert struggled for three hours to separate the snakes and rescue king cobra, one of the world’s deadliest snakes.
The incident occurred at a village near Brahmapur in Odisha, India.
The villagers of Pankala Sahi saw a king cobra trapped in fishing net with a half-eaten rat snake popping out of its mouth on September 8.
The 11-ft king cobra had spotted a rat snake that was trapped in the net and moved in for the kill.
But the 6 feet long rat snake was entwined in the strings of the net. So, while swallowing it, the king cobra got also entangled.
Responding to a call by the villagers, Harish Padhi, a volunteer of Snake Helpline, rushed to the spot.
He held the head of the king cobra while a villager cut the net and freed the snakes.
It was tougher to remove the half swallowed body of rat snake as the strings of the net had got stuck in the fangs of the king cobra making it impossible to swallow or regurgitate.
“We tried several times to pull out the dead rat snake, but could not,” said Harish.
He then carefully cut the strings from the fangs of the king cobra. As he held it, a villager pulled the dead body of the rat snake out of its mouth.
The king cobra was safely released in a nearby forest.
