Master of the bush

I am coordinating flights again this week so there may not be a lot to talk about flight wise. But, that doesn't mean things aren't exciting from time to time around the hangar. One of our flights today entailed bringing out a patient that was bitten by a snake. The snake was a bushmaster. It is a beautifully nasty animal, and very stunning. Now, if you have been reading lately you will notice a lot of snakes. I am not a snake person! Although, I still marvel at their design and function.Here is a close up of it's awesome head (you can see where it was killed with a wooden rod right behind the skull). The snake came in a sack from the village of Copataza where the bite took place. The snake bite patients always try to bring the biting snake with them to make it easier to positively identify what kind of snake bit them, and the doctors in the hospital can administer the correct medicine/antivenin. I'm not sure why he has paper stuffed into his mouth, but that was fine with me. I have seen "dead" snakes do "lively" things, and a dead poisonous snake can still inject venom.
Here you can see that the snake is longer than I am, or around 7 feet from head to tail. Interestingly enough, we just watched a documentary on TV about this species this past weekend. It is not to be messed with or taken lightly. From what I read on the Wiki link above, and saw on the TV show, the patient we hauled out was lucky to be alive.

Time from bite to arrival at the hospital...around 3 hours.
Time from bite to hospital without airplane service...?