The late “Alien” actor John Hurt might have known how this bird feels.
In an amazing photo making the rounds, a snake eel blasts through the stomach of a heron flying over Delaware.
The heron had apparently swallowed the serpent whole.
Photographer Sam Davis told Live Science this week he thought at first that the eel had bitten the bird and clamped on, but after blowing up the photos, he saw an entirely different scenario.
“I could see the eel. You could see its eyes,” he said. “It was actually coming out the other end.”
Kinda like this guy popped out of Hurt’s character in the 1979 sci-fi classic “Alien.”
Davis saw the heron at one point descend to the water with the eel still aboard. “The heron didn’t seem to act much differently,” Davis told Live Science. “It was in the water and flying around.”
Davis took the photo in 2011 but recently shared it with a wildlife photo site, Live Science said.
Snake eels have been known to attempt escape from a predatory fish’s stomach by using its its pointy tail tip to dig through, but they don’t make it past the rib cage, according to The Guardian.
Calling all HuffPost superfans!
Sign up for membership to become a founding member and help shape HuffPost’s next chapter
