Southerners should beware of unexpected alligators in their backyards and swimming pools as Tropical Storm Debby batters the East Coast.
Since Debby made landfall on Monday, several people in South Carolina have filmed enormous alligators prowling their streets and taking a dip in their backyard pools.
‘There is a two meter long’ Robert Moose Rini he said Monday from his car on Hilton Head Island. “Imagine walking around the corner and seeing that thing.”
The reptile slowly crosses the street and then settles in a puddle next to a flower bed.
As the shocked witness drove on, he saw an alligator crawling across the sidewalk.
“There’s a seven-foot-long one,” Robert Moose Rini said Monday from his car on Hilton Head Island. “Imagine walking around the corner and seeing that thing.”
The reptile slowly crossed the road before settling into a puddle
The witness saw an alligator crawling across a sidewalk
Adrienne LeBlanc filmed an alligator swimming in a flooding lagoon in Bluffton, South Carolina.
She filmed the video from her bedroom, watching the alligator “head towards her house.”
“Ugh, I can’t think of anything scarier right now than a big alligator just walking onto my lawn,” she said as she captured the footage.
LeBlanc later filmed the “gator-filled moat around my house.”
“They just love coming here, that’s for sure,” she says. “I mean, they did before the water level went up… This is just unbelievable. They’ve never, never, never been this close.”
LeBlanc expected it would take “weeks for all the water to recede.”
Adrienne LeBlanc filmed an alligator swimming in a flooded lagoon in Bluffton, South Carolina
“Ugh, I can’t imagine anything scarier right now than a big alligator just walking onto my lawn,” LeBlanc said as he captured the footage
Christian Sudduth of Hilton Head saw an eight-foot alligator and nearly ran the reptile over.
“I was lucky to see him,” he said The Island Package.
Another Hilton Head resident spotted an alligator swimming in her backyard pool on Monday.
According to Matt Kraycar of K&K Wildlife Services, the phenomenon is not unusual, as the reptiles are being forced out of their natural habitat, but he does not expect them to stay there for long.
“They’re going back to where the food is and where they’re comfortable,” he told The Island Packet. “Right now they’re just trying to find a safe place.”
Storm Debby continues to strengthen and moves north and northeast from the Carolinas, continuing to bring heavy rains, flash flooding and the threat of tornadoes (Photo: Charleston, South Carolina on Tuesday)
The Mid-Atlantic states and parts of New York and New England will see significant rainfall that could cause dangerous flooding into the weekend (Photo: Charlotte, North Carolina on Thursday)
Experts are warning locals not to swim in floodwaters as alligators and snakes may be lurking nearby.
Storm Debby continues to strengthen and moves north and northeast from the Carolinas, continuing to bring heavy rains, flash flooding and the threat of tornadoes.
According to Jon Porter, chief meteorologist for Accuweather, the Mid-Atlantic states and parts of New York and New England could see significant rainfall that could lead to dangerous flooding into the weekend, including on portions of Interstate 95 near major cities.
Active tornadoes are possible from eastern Virginia to Vermont on Friday.
