An unexpected house guest caused a stir in Lelystad on Friday evening: a 1.20-meter-long snake crawled through a living room. The residents called for help, after which Gerdina Visscher (55) and Henk Kool (66) of animal ambulance Witte Gerrit were quickly on the scene.
“The first thing I asked on the phone was: ‘Where do you live?'” Gerdina tells NU.nl. “He said Lelystad, so I told him that he should call that animal ambulance first. Our working area is the Noordoostpolder, and normally we don’t cross the Ketelbrug, except in real emergencies. If that didn’t work, he could call us back. Within a minute he called back, after which we got in the ambulance.”
Upon arrival, Gerdina and Henk find shocked residents and a large snake, which has hidden under the TV cabinet. “The residents were quite shocked of course. A snake of more than 1.20 meters is crawling around. But when we got closer, we saw that it was a rat snake. They are not poisonous. They can of course jump and bite, but I think it hurts more if you get bitten by a crow.”
The snake, as thick as a human arm, is the largest specimen that Henk and Gerdina have encountered since they started this work in 2021. “We have received a report of a snake twice before, but those were a lot smaller. This was really the biggest, you get adrenaline from that.”
‘You think you would miss such a big snake’
According to Gerdina, it was also a shock for her and Henk, especially at that time. “We work in principle 24 hours a day, only after 9 pm only for emergencies. This was of course a real emergency. We thought for a moment: should we do this? But yes, of course. They can’t sleep while a snake is crawling through their house. You can’t do that to them.”
Gerda and Henk eventually picked up the reptile with two tongs. “They are the kind of tongs you also pick up waste with. You prefer not to use them of course, but you can’t just pick up such a snake.”
How the reptile ended up in the house remains unclear. “We have no idea. You think that if you lose such a big snake, you would miss it. But maybe people are on vacation. Or they are careless.”