State: 392-pound gator bites off man's forearm in Alachua

GAINESVILLE -- Before wading into the water garden at Kanapaha Botanical Gardens, Don Goodman was always careful to search for the few transient alligators who swam there.

On Monday, Goodman didn't look closely enough. Slinking along the pond's floor was an 11-foot bull gator nicknamed Mojo.

As Goodman, the botanical gardens' director, pulled algae off the gardens' prize water lilies, the 392-pound alligator snapped and bit off his right forearm.

Co-workers rushed to help Goodman, and trappers later killed the gator after a struggle and retrieved the limb. But surgeons at Shands hospital were unable to reattach it.

Barbara Bennett, a Kanapaha gardener who was 50 feet from Goodman when the gator struck, said the animal hadn't shown aggression before.

"The large gator had been in the water garden for a few months," Bennett said. "It's never made any moves toward anyone or anything."

After the attack, Goodman yelled to Bennett, who said he remained calm while employees at the gardens put a tourniquet on his wound, just below his elbow.

As Goodman was rushed to Shands, deputies with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission raced to retrieve the severed arm from the reptile's stomach. Alligator trappers were dispatched to the pond, where they located the alligator because of tiny trails it made in the shallow water.

The trappers harpooned Mojo, who managed to ram the boat and knock a trapper into the water, said Capt. Roy Brown of the Conservation Commission.

"It almost caught him," Brown said.

The struggle continued as trappers pulled the gator to the bank and shot it twice. The reptile was then cut open, and Goodman's arm was removed from the gator's stomach, Brown said.

But doctors at Shands at the University of Florida said that when the limb arrived at the hospital, the arm's tissues were shredded and torn.

"It was not a clean laceration," said Dr. Larry Chidgey, who performed Goodman's surgery Monday evening. "There was too much damage to reclaim the part."

Chidgey said that Goodman told him things got blurry after the alligator bit his arm, but he remembered the animal twisting it off.

"When I saw him, there is a certain degree of shock," Chidgey said.

Goodman, 58, was in good spirits and resting comfortably on Tuesday, a hospital official said.

Alligators frequently travel to the gardens from the neighboring Lake Kanapaha, after which the gardens are named.

"In the spring, there were four of varying sizes from there," Bennett said.

Nestled along the southern shores of the 250-acre lake, the gardens warn visitors to beware of alligators. Bennett said this is the first time an alligator has attacked a person at Kanapaha, a 62-acre tourist attraction owned by Alachua County and maintained by the North Florida Botanical Society. Goodman has been director there since 1978.

In Florida, there have been 300 alligator attacks since 1948. Twelve of those attacks resulted in fatalities, Brown said.

Brown speculated that the gator's age may have been the reason for the attack because older alligators tend to go blind. Mojo, who got his nickname from the gardens staff, was about 50 years old, he said.

Goodman is expected to return to work as soon as possible, Bennett said.

"He would be the first one to say he was in the gator's territory," she said. "The gator was doing what was natural."

-- Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.

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