A Texas father’s watchful eye and fast action might have saved his daughter’s life.
On the morning of July 24, Andrew Grande’s son and daughter were playing with a babysitter in the backyard at their League City, Texas, home as Grande watched from inside.
The Houston Chronicle reported that at 8:30 a.m., Grande, 40, saw the head of an 11-foot, 7-inch alligator quickly move out of the canal behind the house. It was heading for his daughter.
“It was a beast,” Grande told the publication. “I had a gut feeling it wanted my daughter as a snack.”
Grande rushed outside, getting his children and the babysitter out of harm’s way and behind a gate.
“He was by far the biggest one we’ve ever seen, and in fact, they have never done that before,” Grande told CNN. “Usually they keep their distance, just pass by. You don’t even know they’re there, but this guy’s intentions were definitely a little different.”
While Grande called for help, he said the gator went back to the canal.
“It kept going up and down. It would look straight at me,” he told the Chronicle. “It seemed like it was playing a game.”
By 10 a.m., Thomas Reynolds, described as a gator hunter by Grande, arrived.
The reptile didn’t get captured without a fight. It ultimately took Texas game wardens Jennifer Provaznik and Austin Shoemaker and multiple neighbors and workers to help secure the alligator.
“It was three hours to get the gator out of the water because it was so big and powerful,” Grande told the Chronicle. “It kept flipping and flopping and turning.”
Seven people, two catch poles, multiple pieces of plywood and some rope later, the nearly 500-pound gator was taken out of the canal. It has since been relocated to Gator Country, an alligator theme park in Beaumont, Texas.
“They were happy to have the alligator because they lost all of theirs during Hurricane Harvey,” said Grande. “I was happy to have it out of my backyard.”
Grande told CNN that at some point he will take his children to the park to visit the gator.
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