Miss Fidget.com

This story is not new, but it is still notable. Do a quick search here at MissFidget.com  to read about Bill Hedden who also lost an arm to a gator. Mr Hedden was quite sober when he encountered a gator, unlike this guy. 

Adrian Apgar is still in a local hospital three months after losing an arm.
By EVA KIS | The Ledger | Tuesday, February 27, 2007

LAKELAND - Adrian J. Apgar was relaxing at a favorite quiet spot before work when his life changed last November.

The Polk City man told police that he’d come to sit on a rock near the bank of Lake Parker many times before the morning of Nov. 29, when an alligator came out of the shallow water and attacked him.

Nearly three months after the attack, Apgar, 45, remains at Lakeland Regional Medical Center, Gary Morse, a spokesman for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, said Monday.

A newly released report by the wildlife commission sheds a few new details on what happened. While it said the alligator was not provoked, it did not conclude what led to the attack.

Trappers captured a 12-foot-2-inch alligator a few hours after the attack at Lake Parker County Park, and Morse said officials were reasonably sure it was the one that bit Apgar.

However, over the next three days, three more alligators were trapped and killed after the wildlife agency received reports that they were being fed. Alligators that are given food by humans overcome their natural fear and learn to associate humans with food.

Necropsies concluded that none of the animals had human remains in their stomachs.

“We weren’t necessarily expecting to find something,” Morse said. “They don’t always swallow what they’ve got.”

The report said Apgar told emergency workers and medical personnel shortly after the attack that he had smoked methamphetamine and fallen asleep before he was attacked.

He later tested positive for methamphetamines and marijuana, the report said.

However, when he was interviewed two months later by wildlife agency investigators, he said he had been sitting near the lake’s bank about 4 a.m. smoking a cigarette when he heard a growl and saw an alligator coming toward him, the report stated.

The gator grabbed him below the waist and dragged him into the water. It briefly released him, only to bite onto his right arm. Then, it clamped onto Apgar’s left arm and began to roll, which mostly tore the arm off except for a few tendons.

Apgar said he doesn’t remember anything that happened after that.

Witnesses who heard his screams called police and three Polk County sheriff’s deputies pulled him from the water.

Apgar was taken to LRMC for treatment. His left arm had to be amputated above the elbow, his right forearm was fractured, and several chunks from his side and buttocks were bitten off, along with other puncture wounds and injuries.

Apgar told investigators he was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, but he was naked when he was rescued.

Morse reminded residents that precautions must be taken in areas where alligators may live.

“All I can say is, don’t go near heavily vegetated areas at a lake between dusk and dawn - the same thing we’ve been saying for more than 30 years.”

Eva Kis can be reached at eva.kis@theledger.com or 863-802-7550.
Adrian J. Apgar