A 26-year-old Florida woman suffered severe injuries after she was attacked by a massive alligator while swimming at Key Lake Wilderness Park in Cocoa. There were about a dozen other people in the lake when bystanders heard Nicole Tillman cry for help and rushed over to her aid.
"We're hanging out about waist to chest deep in the lake, next thing you know a girl starts screaming and luckily a couple guys reacted and grab her," eyewitness Dave Nygard told ABC News. "I thought she was more or less joking around... next thing you know we pull her out and her side and her thigh were open. So then about 30 seconds later I see a gator head pop up. It was every bit of eight foot."
The area where Tillman was swimming was remote and not easily accessible, so the group that pulled her out of the water placed her on an ATV and drove her out of the woods. After a few miles, they reached a road where a helicopter was standing by to take her to the hospital. Officials say that she suffered "significant" injuries, but they were not life-threatening, and she is expected to make a full recovery.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission is handling the investigation and sent an alligator trapper to remove the massive reptile from the area.
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