Woman dies in python attack after being swallowed up to her shoulders, Indonesia officials say

A woman was found dead after being attacked by a python in central Indonesia, police and local officials said Friday, the third such death in the province since June.

Maga, a 74-year-old woman who like many Indonesians had one name, raised concerns when she did not return home on Wednesday, prompting a search by relatives.

She was found dead presumably “because of being constricted and bitten by the snake,” said Supriadi, police spokesman in Palopo city in South Sulawesi province.

He told AFP the snake in question was a 13-foot python.

The woman was found with bites on her head and legs near her family home after going to work in a field, said Awaluddin, head of Padang Lambe district in Palopo.

She was found in Padang Lambe by her daughter with the snake just feet from her body, Awaluddin told AFP.

Locals beat the snake to death and said the woman had been swallowed up to her shoulders and vomited out, he added.

Other deadly python atacks

Deaths by large constrictors are considered rare, but several people in Indonesia have been killed by pythons in recent years — including two other women since June.  

Last month, a woman was found dead inside the belly of a snake after it swallowed her whole in Siteba village, in South Sulawesi province. Police said the 36-year-old mother had gone missing after she left her house to buy medicine for her sick child.

In June a woman was found dead inside the belly of a reticulated python in another district of South Sulawesi. Graphic video published by TMZ appeared to show the snake being cut open in a wooded area while more footage posted by the Daily Mail appeared to show the woman’s body being carried in a blanket past distressed villagers.

Last year residents in the province killed an eight-meter python, which was found strangling and eating one of the farmers in a village.

In 2022, a woman in Indonesia’s Jambi province was killed and swallowed whole by a python, the BBC reported, citing local media.

In 2018, a 54-year-old woman was found dead inside a seven-meter python in Southeast Sulawesi’s Muna town.

The year before that, a farmer in West Sulawesi went missing before being found eaten alive by a four-meter python at a palm oil plantation. A six-minute video obtained by CBS News showed villagers slicing open the python’s carcass to reveal the legs and torso of the dead victim, named Akbar.

The reticulated python is the longest snake in the world, according to London’s Natural History Museum. They are native to Southern Asia and can grow to be more than 20 feet long.

Zoo Atlanta, which houses reticulated pythons, says the snakes “have a reputation for being aggressive.”