I interview Will Georgitis (@voodoofossils84 on Instagram) about his unbelievable fight against a massive alligator while he was diving for Megalodon shark teeth fossils in a South Carolina river. This interview happened while we were looking for more shark teeth together at @palmettofossilexcursions (great place to find some yourself!)
If you want to see my full story, watch the previous video I posted here.
My shark tooth jewelry, Megalodons, apparel and much more can be found on SHRKco.com!
If you want to see my full story, watch the previous video I posted here.
My shark tooth jewelry, Megalodons, apparel and much more can be found on SHRKco.com!
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NewsTranscript
00:00Hey, my name is Jeffrey Hein, and if you've heard of me, it's because of the alligator
00:04attack skull fracture I survived while diving for megalodon shark teeth in a Florida river.
00:09But today, we're going to be talking about another diver looking for megalodon shark
00:13teeth who was attacked and narrowly survived with his life.
00:16His name is Will Georgides, who is also all over the news, but he was attacked by a 13
00:22foot alligator and had a much crazier fight that he narrowly survived.
00:26I can't believe he got out of this alive.
00:28We're going to go over every single detail and it gets insane.
00:32Me and Will have been trying to get together for the longest time now.
00:36Four months?
00:37Five months?
00:38Yeah.
00:39Yeah.
00:40Ever since you got bit.
00:41Yeah, pretty much.
00:42You're like, yeah, as soon as you can, let me know and we'll meet up, and it's been about
00:44four months, five months now.
00:47And I remember that I reached out right away because I was thinking, I know what is about
00:52to happen to you with the media and everything.
00:54Oh, dude.
00:55Yeah.
00:56You were right, too.
00:58I couldn't relent for a while.
00:59I don't even remember what I said, but I was just like, if you need anything, let me know.
01:03When I went through the whole media frenzy, like your phone blowing up, everybody coming
01:07out of the woodwork, asking you what happened.
01:10Tell me your story.
01:11What happened?
01:12Can we get an interview?
01:13Can we do this?
01:14Yeah, all that stuff.
01:15And then, of course, everybody that I used to know years ago, all the way back to babysitters
01:19I had when I was a little kid, were like, yeah, I remember babysitting you, and are
01:23you okay?
01:24About all this stuff.
01:25But it's like, yeah.
01:27Did babysitters reach out?
01:28That's crazy.
01:29Oh, dude.
01:30Way long.
01:31Yeah, it's weird.
01:32It was really weird, actually.
01:33I didn't have any babysitters.
01:34Yeah, it's strange.
01:35I had people from middle school, like I'm a personal trainer, part-time, and I had people
01:39that I met with one time who would reach out to me years later and say, I saw you on the
01:46news.
01:47Like, oh, okay.
01:48It's like, you were the guy.
01:49Yeah.
01:50Yeah.
01:51So it took a while to get back, but the whole media frenzy was a lot.
01:55You have to do public relations on your own, all of a sudden, in addition to fighting this
02:00injury and trauma.
02:01Yeah.
02:02While you're trying to recover, while you're in the hospital, while you're answering all
02:04these doctors' questions, nurses want you here, doctors want you there, you have an
02:08appointment here, appointment there, and then it's like, oh, but we need you to stop everything
02:12you're doing.
02:13So you come talk to us, and it's like, all right.
02:15And then you warned me.
02:16I mean, you did warn me.
02:17And that was kind of one of the, you say you don't remember what you said, but you were
02:20like, hey, by the way, it's about to be a shitstorm, something along those lines, and
02:24I was like, I can help do it a little bit.
02:26I remember I got you before the national news.
02:29Yeah.
02:30Yeah.
02:31It was just local.
02:32It had stopped me at that point.
02:33You're like, it's about to get crazy, too.
02:34Yeah, it definitely did.
02:35I wish I could have talked to you a little more, honestly, because it did get weird.
02:41It was weird.
02:42It's hard to, I experienced like a news station trying to twist my experience into the fact
02:50that I provoked a gator, and then it's my fault.
02:54But that didn't happen, and that was a time where we didn't have the footage.
02:57So for the first two weeks, we didn't have the footage.
02:59And you couldn't say, yeah.
03:01And people, most people believed me.
03:02They were making their own story.
03:03But then they said, yeah.
03:05And I had a black eye on my face, and this guy is arguing with me, like taking me through
03:10the ringer for like an hour, and it ended up not airing, thankfully, because.
03:15Because it was so weird of an interview.
03:18He messed up and didn't get my consent before.
03:23So he tried, after he was grilling me for an hour, and I'm stressed for the next two
03:27days.
03:28And you're mad at this point.
03:29Yeah, you are.
03:30For the next two days, I threw up at 3 a.m. from anxiety and panic attacks, thinking about
03:33this news story that was going to drop and ruin my life.
03:36Because that's how bad he made me look, and I didn't know how it was going to be edited.
03:40Well, thank God that nothing like that happened.
03:42And then two days later, and I'm watching the news, waiting for it to come out, and
03:45it never did.
03:46And then he emailed me, he said, can we get you to sign off on that interview?
03:49And I said, no.
03:50Absolutely not.
03:51I told him I was throwing up at 3 a.m. from that.
03:53I said, absolutely not.
03:54I'm done.
03:55I'm done.
03:56That was crazy.
03:57But your experience is different, because you're in the hospital so long.
03:59Yeah, yeah.
04:00It was six, well, I think six days, and then they let me out.
04:03And it was more so, like, I made them let me go.
04:06It was like, I'm not sitting here anymore.
04:09I mean, that's a whole other story, dude.
04:11I could go on for days about that one.
04:13The hospital experience was completely awful.
04:15I mean, like, the most awful experience I think I've ever been through, where anybody
04:20was supposed to be helping.
04:21That's crazy.
04:22Like, I've been treated better by car mechanics.
04:24I've been treated better with my pets, veterinary situations and things like that.
04:30It was weird.
04:32My sister's a nurse, dude.
04:33It got to the point where she had to be there on a live call with me when the nurses would
04:37come in, so that she could make them open up their computers to find the files that
04:41showed what they were supposed to be doing.
04:44And then they would open it, and they'd be like, oh, we didn't know that that's what
04:48we were supposed to be doing.
04:49And she's like, no, this is day one nursing.
04:52And they were literally, like, refusing service to me or whatever.
04:55All kinds of...
04:56It's another story.
04:57That's crazy.
04:58It was, dude, like, torture sessions.
05:00Like, some of them nurses were, like, making me be in the worst thing I could ever be in
05:06kind of thing.
05:07It was like, scale of one to ten, what kind of pain are you in?
05:10I'm like, ten.
05:11Dude, ten, bro.
05:12Ten.
05:13Right now.
05:14Like, I'm, like, rolling.
05:15I can't, like, I want to get up, but I can't get up and all this other stuff.
05:18And they're like, oh, we gave you a medication, you know, two hours ago, so we just can't
05:22do anything for another two hours.
05:23Because the medication schedule you're on, blah, blah, blah, all this stuff.
05:28And then I'm telling my sister about this, and she's a nurse, and she's like, that's
05:32fucked up.
05:33Whatever.
05:34You know, like, I got to be there when they come in the room next time.
05:36So your sister who knows better how to do their jobs for them.
05:40How to do their job for them.
05:41Because it was like, they came in, they're like, here's your medication.
05:43She's like, stop right now.
05:45Go into the computer, open up this file.
05:48Now scroll down, see where it says this, open up that file.
05:51Now you see that list?
05:52That's the list of what you're supposed to be giving him.
05:55And the hour regimen that you're supposed to be giving him.
05:58Dude, I saw the list, it was like that fucking long.
06:00It was like, I mean, it wasn't one or two lines of medication.
06:04It was like, dude, you're supposed to give him this many things.
06:06So it was like, nerve blockers, muscle relaxers, things that would, like, actually, like, deaden
06:11pain between here and there.
06:13And they were refusing to give me those things.
06:15Dude, they were giving me Tylenol.
06:17It's like, my arm was broke off, the other one dislocated completely, stapled all up,
06:21metal plates in my arms, and they were giving me Tylenol.
06:25Because they didn't want to give me more, I don't know why, but they were literally
06:28like, no, we can't give you any more, we gave you Tylenol two hours ago, it's a four-hour
06:31thing.
06:32They were doing it incorrectly.
06:34Oh, dude, mad incorrectly, mad incorrectly.
06:37To the point where it was like, I was supposed to be on, like I said, muscle relaxers and
06:41nerve blockers and all this other stuff all the way down the line, and they were doing
06:45paramedicine.
06:46And then that nurse finally realized, and she was like, okay, well, I'll do what you're
06:50supposed to, and then the next nurse shift would start, and it'd be right back to torture
06:55session.
06:56Oh my gosh, it was over.
06:57Oh, God, dude.
06:58And it was like, okay, so every 12 hours, it was another torture session would start,
07:02and then I'd have to tell this person to look up on their computer, all this other stuff.
07:07Every 12 hours, dude.
07:08And then it was like, I'm in here six days, it's like, at day six, I was like, get the
07:12fuck out of here.
07:13Like, please let me go.
07:14Please let me go.
07:15Aftercare was that bad.
07:16I had no idea that happened.
07:18Oh, dude, nobody, it was to the point, all right, so when they went to discharge me,
07:23they're like, okay, somebody's going to come in, and they're going to tell you all your
07:27aftercare instructions, and they're going to give you all your stuff for you to go,
07:31your packet, whatever.
07:32A lady came in, she set an envelope down on the counter and said, I'll be right back to
07:36talk to you about this.
07:37And then two hours went by, and another person came in that was not that person originally.
07:42Another person came in, and they were like, okay, you're good to go.
07:45They're like, wait, what about aftercare instructions?
07:49They're like, they didn't talk to you about that?
07:50It's like, no, no, no, no, they came in and left the envelope.
07:53And they're like, oh, well, they should have talked to you about that, but you're good
07:56to go.
07:57All right, can you talk to me about it?
07:59They're like, no, no, no, no, that's another person.
08:01I was like, well, how about you send them back?
08:02Oh, yeah, well, I'll go find them, I'll send them back.
08:04And then two hours later, another person, why are you still here?
08:08It's like, all right, all right, like, do y'all know how to do your job?
08:13And then it was one of these things where I was like, dude, they were about to send
08:15me out.
08:16Like, I didn't have a sling, I didn't have anything.
08:17I'm like, hey, can I get the sling?
08:18Y'all gave me a sling before, but you cut it off.
08:20And they're like, where is it?
08:21I'm like, it's over there on the counter, cut up, and they're like, well, just use that
08:25one.
08:26And I was like, dude, you cut it apart.
08:29You literally cut it in half because you needed to x-ray my arm one more time, and so you
08:33cut it off because you couldn't move my arm, and then you never gave me another one.
08:37And then the lady's like, oh, they did that.
08:41And I'm like, well, I don't even know if we have any more of those.
08:44So like, if they didn't give you another one, then you're probably not supposed to have
08:47it.
08:48That's crazy.
08:49I was like, wait a minute, like, you just told me they gave me one, so I was supposed
08:53to have one, and they cut it off because they couldn't, my arm can't move.
08:59And then because they didn't give me a second one, I'm not supposed to have one.
09:01My arm can't move.
09:02Did you hear me say that?
09:04Like, they cut it off because my arm can't move.
09:07So like, they're like, just go on, go on.
09:10And then it was like, it actually took, my mom at that point, she was there.
09:14She went walking around the hospital until she like, she stopped every single person.
09:18Can I get a sling?
09:19Can I get a sling?
09:20Can I get a sling?
09:21Can I get a sling?
09:22Can I get a sling?
09:23Until they finally found somebody who could actually find the sling to give it to me to
09:25get out the hospital.
09:26Dude, it was insane.
09:27They even sent my prescription to a pharmacy that they closed.
09:31They let me go at 9 p.m.
09:33The pharmacy closed at 8 p.m.
09:36So it was like, what am I supposed to do?
09:37It was like, I was on a three-hour pain med, you know, like, dude, so it's like, what am
09:40I supposed to do?
09:41And it was a Sunday or something weird, so it was like, am I supposed to wait until Monday
09:44morning?
09:45Like, I'm supposed to be taking an antibiotic every certain amount of time, too.
09:49And it's like, well, they were like, oh, just figure it out.
09:51It's like, no, no, no, y'all figure it out.
09:53Y'all, y'all figure it out.
09:54When I was infected from mine, because I got a bit on the hand, too, it swelled up.
09:58And I, now, my care was great.
10:01I was lucky.
10:02That's one of the ways ours is a little bit different, because I have no complaints.
10:05South Carolina versus Florida is a little different.
10:06I guess.
10:07Yeah.
10:08I went to, and I was near Sarasota, so I went to Sarasota Memorial, and they were great.
10:13But I missed my antibiotics by like an hour, and my fever, like, I had a paramedic checking
10:20in on me, and he said, if this goes up one more degree, we're going back to the hospital
10:25from the infection.
10:26So that was just from the puncture wounds.
10:29But also, I want to talk about back to the attack itself.
10:33Yeah.
10:34Like, there's so much more that you told me that the news never put on.
10:37No, no, no, they didn't.
10:38And I know they only do the, the news doesn't.
10:40The hot flash.
10:41Yeah, yeah.
10:42There's a hot flash.
10:43They want the key things, one paragraph, whatever.
10:45But like, your story is different.
10:48And there's a lot of detail.
10:50So I just want you to let it go.
10:52From the beginning?
10:53All right.
10:54Yeah.
10:55From the beginning.
10:56So I dove a whole.
10:57All right.
10:58So I dove commercially.
11:01I find a lot of shark teeth.
11:02That's what I do.
11:04And I'd had a customer of mine who's bought from me for quite a few years.
11:09And we talked back and forth through social media quite a lot, years of it.
11:12And he wanted to come fossil diving.
11:14So I was like, all right, I'll show you the way.
11:16I've been doing this for years.
11:17I thought I knew what I was doing.
11:19And so he came down.
11:21We went out.
11:22I was showing him how to how to do it in the Cooper River, which is where I started myself.
11:26So I did my first dive.
11:29Perfect.
11:30Nothing went wrong.
11:32His first dive, he was a little nervous.
11:33So he ended it early.
11:34But nothing went wrong.
11:35Yeah, a lot of mosquitoes out here.
11:39But so, yeah, nothing went wrong first dive for me.
11:42Nothing went wrong first dive for him.
11:43He goes into a second dive.
11:45He did the second dive fine.
11:47Spent the whole dive down there.
11:48Did okay.
11:49I mean, he was novice.
11:50So he didn't do great.
11:51But I mean, he did a full dive, found teeth, all that stuff.
11:57So the second dive for myself, I did the same spot he had just done.
12:00Same spot I've been diving for years and years and years.
12:02I think I've done 60 dives on it.
12:04At least.
12:05I don't know exactly.
12:06Not exactly the number.
12:07But yeah, close to 60 dives.
12:10And you know, did my whole dive, you know, I was finding awesome teeth, you know, I found
12:14like just before I finished the dive, I found a 5.8 something meg.
12:18It was it was complete.
12:19It was awesome.
12:20It was nice.
12:21It was really good.
12:22I mean, I was having a great day all the way up until that point.
12:23So literally my thought was, I'm having a great day.
12:27There ain't no reason for me to push this any farther than I already have.
12:30I've got 700 psi left in my tank.
12:32Like I'm good.
12:33I could go till 500, but I don't need to.
12:35I got a good meg just now.
12:36Like I'm just going to end it now.
12:38I got one more tank on the boat.
12:40It's good.
12:41Good day.
12:42It's a great day.
12:43That's literally what I was thinking as I was going.
12:44Wow.
12:45It's been a great day.
12:46So you came up with more air than you normally do.
12:47Yeah.
12:48Normally I'll push it to three, 500 to 300.
12:50Hey, thanks for making it this far.
12:52If you want to learn more about Will, his Instagram is in the description below.
12:59And we're pretty small here.
13:00So it'd really help us get his story out.
13:02If you drop a like a comment and pop that subscribe button, but let's get back to it
13:06because it gets even crazier.
13:08Right.
13:09And there's a lot to it.
13:11Like every minute matters.
13:13Every second matters, especially in a situation like that.
13:15But you were saying that you came up with more air than I normally ever do.
13:19Yeah.
13:21Like 500 is where it's like, that's when you're supposed to call it.
13:24Like you should come up with 500 PSI.
13:28I came up with 750.
13:29Well, I started coming up with 750.
13:31Normally I will push my PSI all the way down to 300 before I even come up.
13:35Cause it's like, I know what the surface is.
13:37I know I don't have trees in between me and that.
13:39Like I know, I know my area.
13:40It's like, obviously if I'm diving an area I don't know, I will be conservative.
13:44But if I know it, like the back of my hand, like this spot, it's like, Oh, I know how
13:49what's above me and what's below.
13:51You know?
13:52Yeah.
13:53So I was like, I could have pushed it, but I was like, no, no, no, I'm fine.
13:56Happy with what I had.
13:57So I came up with 750.
13:59As soon as I broke the surface, I do the normal thing.
14:03I look around, look for my boat, look for, you know, orient myself, see my boat.
14:08I looked to my left and there was an alligator.
14:15So let me backtrack a little bit.
14:16So when I was ready to come up from the bottom, I saw I had 750 and one of the rules that
14:23all of us river divers follow, if you're, if you're not tied to your anchor still is
14:29get away from the bank before you come up.
14:31If you want to come up next to the bank, you're almost guaranteed to come up next to a gator
14:35because that's where the gators are.
14:36They're on the banks, always on the banks.
14:37I didn't know that.
14:38So it's like, I didn't know that rule.
14:41Yeah.
14:42That's one of the ones we follow is like, get away from the bank before you come up.
14:44If you come up right next to the bank, you might come up next to one.
14:47So it's like, at least maybe in the middle of the river, you got better chance.
14:51So I moved out 40 feet into the center of the river.
14:54And then I came up and literally 40 feet back towards the bank was where the gator was.
15:01And he was sitting in the water, basically, wait, lined up with me perfectly.
15:05So I assume he was waiting for me to come up, which under what you can hear underwater
15:11in the bubbles come up, I've seen gators, but female gators will make bubbles.
15:16That's one of the things the males look for.
15:18So it's like, a lot of things that could have been a factor that involved, you know, all
15:25the different things that caused it to happen.
15:29There's quite a lot.
15:30There's the mating season thing.
15:31There's the, well, I mean, I've got a lot of people talking about that too, like mating
15:35season thing.
15:36The fact that that one is the territorial gator that other people have talked to me
15:41about that afterwards.
15:42Like, I've dove that spot a lot, but I haven't dove it in a few years and I said in the last
15:46couple of years, there was one that had been sitting there, seemed territorial because
15:50he would come at boats and stuff like that.
15:52I wish I'd known that, wish I'd known that before I went out there, I thought it was
15:56a safe spot because I dove it so many times and never seen one.
16:00So, but in the last couple of years, since I've been there, I guess this guy right there.
16:06There's a couple of other factors too, but yeah, I moved away from the bank, but I think
16:11I kind of enticed him because the way the bottom of that river is, I had gone back and
16:15forth between 40 and 20 feet, which he was probably sitting at 20 feet, I'm assuming
16:1920 or 15 or somewhere in there that lived just before the bank, but I would come up
16:23close to the bank and then go back down, come up close to the bank and go back down.
16:26And then by the time I-
16:27Right in the territory.
16:28Yeah, right into it.
16:29I mean, I was probably could have tickled him if I had known he was there.
16:31You know, like he was probably, I mean, I could have been within a few feet of him underwater
16:34and not known it.
16:35You know, so, but anyway, come up to the surface, he's over there to my left.
16:41I'm going, tide's coming in, so we're going up river and he's going up river, I'm going
16:45up river.
16:46And as soon as I see him, he sees me and he kind of like pops his head to the side.
16:52So he's facing up, lined up with me.
16:55And I guess as soon as he saw that I wasn't just a plant or something, I mean, he skyrocketed
16:59up out of the water he comes at.
17:01And so he's-
17:02He said he was like up out of the water.
17:03Yeah, so he started coming at me real fast and had a weight coming off his neck.
17:07And so I know he's coming, I look at my boat, I see the guy on the boat's not looking.
17:11So he's, he doesn't even know that this is the situation is going down.
17:15I don't think he even knew that I was at the surface yet.
17:18So I hollered at the boat, I was like, you know, you know, pardon my French, but fucking
17:22help me.
17:23You know, yell that out and the guy on the boat turns, he looks.
17:26But as soon as I yelled, the gator, I guess heard a voice or a sound come out and he's
17:31like, the gator's like, oh, it's definitely alive.
17:34And so he just turns on full speed.
17:36I mean, he was already coming at me fast, but then it was like, dude, there was a weight
17:39coming off his chest.
17:41Like it was coming up from underneath.
17:42That's great.
17:43I mean, his feet weren't touching the water.
17:45He was like up.
17:46And even though the guy on the boat said he's, he saw the whole body of the gator come up
17:49out of the water.
17:50Everything like the only thing that was in the water was the tail.
17:54So like within three seconds, this gator's on me.
17:56Like I was hoping it was a territorial push like towards me and he was just going to stop
18:00at a certain point.
18:01But then he never stopped.
18:02He just kept coming and kept coming until he's like me to you distance.
18:05And I was like, okay, it's on.
18:07And he turns his head like, ah, you know, opens his head up or mouth turned sideways
18:11like this to come down on my head.
18:14And I instinctively like I had the screwdriver in my hand.
18:17I instinctively kind of went to like hit him in the chin and push his head over.
18:21Like I think I was, I was trying to push his head away from me.
18:24So I kicked back and my, my screwdriver touched the side of his chin instead of the center
18:29of it and slid up the side and he felt it touch the side of his mouth and he came back,
18:34you know, snap back on my arm that was, had touched the side of his head.
18:38They're so quick.
18:39So again, if I hadn't done that, it would have been on my head and then it would have
18:43been over.
18:44Yeah.
18:45And, but luckily it got my arm instead.
18:46So, so you were sitting here with the screwdriver.
18:48I'm sitting here like this, like waiting, he's coming, he's coming, he's coming and
18:50he goes like that and I just like that and he goes and just slapped on my arm and it
18:56was like, dude, I mean like that didn't even come close to the sound.
19:00I mean it's it, there was a sound, there was a shockwave feeling with the, like it was,
19:05it sounded like taking two two by fours and popping them together real hard.
19:09Oh my God.
19:10And I mean it felt like a pallet of bricks dropped on my arm instantly and then I, of
19:14course I knew what happened.
19:15Like I, it's like I got locked in and I was like, fuck bad situation, bad situation, not
19:21where I want to be.
19:22I'm going to die.
19:23I'm going to die.
19:24I'm going to die.
19:25Those are my thoughts.
19:26And then he started freaking out and doing the panic thing.
19:28So I'm like pushing on his mouth, trying to open it, like freaking out, freaking out.
19:31I was like, oh, he's going to spin.
19:32He's going to spin.
19:33So I bear hugged him as fast as I could.
19:34That's great.
19:35And then he drops down like all silent predator, like just, just drops down three inches, four
19:42inches or not three, four inches, three, four feet below the surface.
19:46So I'm underneath them basically like hugging them from underneath and got my legs wrapped
19:51around his neck and my arms wrapped around his nose and he just hold me down three, four
19:55feet.
19:56I don't know why I can see the surface, but it's like that far away.
19:59And so I can see enough light.
20:00Really?
20:01Yeah.
20:02It was weird.
20:03And we, it went dead still cause he was floating with the current now at this point.
20:05So it was like calm still.
20:06So like he went silent.
20:07I'm just sitting there struggling.
20:08But yeah, so struggling at the surface, trying to open his mouth futilely.
20:15You know, there's no reason for me to even push on his mouth.
20:19But then I'm like, oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
20:20My screwdriver.
20:21And I'm like, I look and it's there.
20:23It's dangling.
20:24I was like, oh, it's still here.
20:25And I'm like, so you had to let it go through the first bike.
20:28Oh, through the first.
20:29I mean, I didn't even know I still had, like, it was kind of when I'm like, oh crap, crap.
20:34And I'm like, what do I do now?
20:36What do I do now?
20:37What do I do now?
20:38What do I do now?
20:39And it's like, oh yeah, screwdriver, screwdriver, stab, stab.
20:40So I let go with this arm cause I'm, I'm trying to hug like this.
20:43I'm like, let go with this arm and I have to grab.
20:47So I grab a reach and it's like, oh, there it is.
20:49It's still there.
20:50Oh thank God.
20:51It's still there.
20:52Grab the screwdriver.
20:53I can't believe you were able to grab the screwdriver.
20:54Yeah.
20:55So you have to grab it with another arm as you're holding onto this 13 foot alligator
20:57with three limbs.
20:58Yeah.
20:59It was weird.
21:00It was weird.
21:01But yeah, so the edge of his jaw was here.
21:02So like right there on my mouth.
21:03So like, or on my arm.
21:04So like this was free and the screwdriver was right here.
21:07So it was dang good.
21:08Oh my gosh.
21:09Yeah.
21:10Again, pure luck.
21:11Three inches of mouth.
21:12Pure luck.
21:13To risk.
21:14Pure luck again.
21:15And that wasn't on your BC.
21:16I use a one on my BC.
21:17Yeah.
21:18And it was, all right.
21:19So my knife is right here and his.
21:21You couldn't have gotten to your knife.
21:22Yeah.
21:23It was like, he pushed it.
21:24Yeah.
21:25It pinned it.
21:26Yeah.
21:27You could not have gotten to your knife.
21:28So luckily it was like only because the screwdriver was there and only because he didn't just
21:30happen to snap it up into the jaw to like, if he had actually caught it in his teeth,
21:35I wouldn't have been able to pull that screwdriver out.
21:38So it was luck, pure luck again.
21:41And that happens a lot.
21:42It's the luck in this situation.
21:43But yeah.
21:44So I realized the screwdriver is there.
21:48I go to look, pull myself sideways and I look and I can see his eye and it's, he doesn't
21:52have that plate closed over it.
21:54He's just got his eye kind of like, he's, he's got his eye closed, but it's not like
21:58clamped.
21:59Okay.
22:00So I was like, okay, I can see like an eye lid and I can see like thick line.
22:03Underwater.
22:04Underwater.
22:05I'm like, look at, well, I mean, I'm holding him like this, like I can just see his eyes
22:08right there.
22:09You know?
22:10So it's like, I got time cause I've got my BC on, my tank still got air in it.
22:15I'm breathing.
22:16I'm like looking.
22:17What do I do?
22:18So I look, I can see this thick, thick line in his eyelids.
22:20So I was like, okay, that's the connection point.
22:23So I grabbed the screwdriver.
22:25I lined it up like millimeters away from his eye.
22:28I didn't want to touch him and just have him freak out or whatever, close it, cut it down.
22:31So I like let it get just a touch before and then just jammed it as hard as I could.
22:37I don't know what happened at that point other than he exploded underneath me.
22:40Like I thought I had a grip on him, but it found out that that, I mean, I already know
22:46he's a strong gator and everybody knows that alligators are strong.
22:49I didn't know how strong, obviously, until you feel it, do you feel it till you're attached
22:55to it and that thing doesn't move, but you're going everywhere else.
22:58Like, I mean, he, if I could have watched that video, that would have been the part
23:02I wanted to see.
23:03Cause I felt like, dude, I ragdolled in his mouth.
23:05I mean, he like that, like a dog with a toy, like it was, and I mean, I was hugging him
23:10as hard as I possibly could gripping on for my life.
23:13And within seconds I was starfished out in front of him on my stomach.
23:17And he's out in front of me with my arm like this and I'm like, you know, like supermanning.
23:21I didn't know any of this.
23:23And so, yeah, dude, it's a crazy story.
23:24It's such a long fight.
23:26Oh dude, it was stupid long.
23:27It sucks actually how long it was.
23:29So he has me starfished out.
23:31I'm thinking, okay, now he's going to roll.
23:32Cause he's got me out in the open.
23:33I don't know how long we were holding on to him.
23:35So I instantly grab a hold of him again.
23:37And I think he was like, okay, it just stabbed me while it was hugging my head while he's
23:41hugging my head again.
23:42I need to get this thing away from the surface.
23:43So he instantly, it was to the bottom.
23:47And I know when I read that you're, you said your back hit the bottom.
23:52Oh dude.
23:53Talk about like the grossest feeling in your, you know, it's kind of one of those, is this
23:59really happening?
24:00Is he taking me down?
24:01Is he taking me like, cause I'm like, okay, we're going somewhere cause I could feel water
24:04going around me.
24:05You have no idea where?
24:06No.
24:07And it starts getting real dark.
24:08And then my ears start going.
24:11You know, so I'm thinking like, I'm, he's, I think he's taking me down.
24:15And so like, I'm like, okay, I got to pop my ears cause they were starting to hurt real
24:19bad, which is crazy that I had thought to pop my ears.
24:22And then I was like, okay, well if he's going to take me all up, cause we're going 50 feet
24:25down and it takes a second to get down there.
24:26So I had time to think.
24:28So he's like, if he's going to take me down there, I'm feeling my BC all the way up.
24:31Like feel till it's like, I mean, it's 40 plus pounds of lift on that one.
24:36So I'm like, I'm gonna make it harder on him.
24:38And also like, if I don't make it through this, I'll float to the surface.
24:43That was my last ditch.
24:44Like at least if I die, I'm going to be found.
24:47Like somebody might find me.
24:48And so that was one of the thoughts going through my head at that moment.
24:51It gets real pitch black, all of a sudden slam into the bottom of the river, neck first,
24:56head first in the back.
24:57And so it was like kind of one of those, oh shit, I'm right here now.
24:59It could have been your, that could have broken your neck.
25:01Oh, it could have very easily.
25:02Yeah.
25:03Luckily the bottom of the river, super squishy mud.
25:05So it was like, it was like pluff mud stuff.
25:06So like I squished into it, like, you know, but yeah, it's still scary as crap.
25:12And then, um, and then, so he lands on top of me, so he's got all his four feet on the
25:16ground and I'm underneath him, like laying on my belly up and, uh, I can't see anything
25:23at this point.
25:24Um, my flashlight's attached to my left hand, so I could pull my arm up like this and I
25:28could see, and then I dropped to do something with this hand, the one free hand, and then
25:32it would go black.
25:33And so I pull it up and I could see, and then it go black.
25:36And then pull it up and go see.
25:37So I grabbed my screwdriver again and it goes pitch black and it's like, fuck, I want to
25:41get him in the eye so bad.
25:42Again, I wanted so badly to hit him in the eye, but I couldn't cause I couldn't see.
25:45And I was like, if I stab him in the eye and he blows up again, like you did before, like
25:49that hurts so bad, dude, I can't imagine, I can't describe it.
25:53So anybody can imagine how bad that hurt when he shook me.
25:57So I was like, if I do that again and I don't get him in his eye and he shakes me again,
26:00I'm done.
26:01I'm not going to have any more fight left for me.
26:03So I was like, I need to stab him somewhere where it counts without missing.
26:06So I didn't know what else to do.
26:08So I put my hand down on his teeth, basically ran my hand down the jaw line until I found,
26:14I was like tooth, tooth, tooth, until I found that big one, the big middle tooth that hangs
26:18down real far.
26:20And then I stuck the screwdriver blade into the crevice on the inside.
26:25So like up against his tooth, let it slide up on the tooth until it hit the gun.
26:29And then I put my hand underneath it, like palmed it like this, and then just jammed
26:32as hard as I could with everything I had.
26:34And I could feel it kind of pop through bone or gums or something.
26:37I felt it go.
26:39And he blew up again.
26:40He shook me like crazy.
26:41I could feel his teeth going like that on my arm.
26:44And it popped me out towards like the front of his mouth.
26:47So I was at like the canines, but never got out.
26:49So that's why there's like little holes here, here and here and here, because I was at the
26:52front of his mouth there.
26:53That's cool.
26:54So there's inside mouth and then front of his mouth there, but then he still had me
26:57locked in.
26:59So I pulled my light back and I could see like, I could see my arm like at his canine.
27:03So they're sticking up like this and sticking down like that.
27:06So I was like, I can see my arm almost free.
27:08It's like yank, yank.
27:09And it doesn't move again.
27:10So I'm like, you know, try to push up and I'm still locked in.
27:12So I couldn't move.
27:14And then my air ran out.
27:16So that was like, you know, I'm already hyperventilating, my heart's going like crazy.
27:22You know, screaming like, you know, and then all of a sudden, oh my God.
27:28And it was like, okay, 10 seconds is literally what the thought was in my head.
27:3210 seconds.
27:33I got to think about like, what do I do or I'm dead.
27:35And then it was all the thoughts, you know, oh, my family, oh, they're going to be sad.
27:39These people that I used to, you know, everybody's going to think this blah, blah, blah, whatever.
27:42You know, the thoughts run through your head when you're that close to being dead.
27:47And then I was literally, it was like, he can have my arm.
27:51Fuck it.
27:52I don't need it.
27:53And I thought he was already through it because of the amount of shaking he did.
27:57The fact that his jaw was on the bone, like on the joint.
28:01So I figured he was already like halfway through.
28:04And I really thought that that was, that I was like, okay, that's my only way.
28:07So I put my feet on the side of his head.
28:09So like my arms in his teeth and I put one foot on one side of my arm, the other foot
28:14on the other side of my arm.
28:16And then I just ripped backward and try to kick his head away as far as hard as I could
28:20rip my arm backwards to try and tear it off at the elbow.
28:23And all of a sudden I was free.
28:26Like, you know, obviously still can't breathe and you know, so I'm kicking up to the surface
28:32and then I'm like, Oh, I can't come up too fast because the bends.
28:35And then I'm also thinking like, well, if I come straight up and he comes straight up,
28:38well, round two and I got nothing left, you know, so I'm like, ah, what do I do?
28:43So I'm just kicking as hard as I can at the side, not even thinking about coming up fast
28:46or slow.
28:47I'm like, if I just go sideways, my BC is already full.
28:49I can, it'll pull me up no matter what to go sideways, dude.
28:52Yeah.
28:53Weird.
28:54And then I'm like, I'm freaking out, like trying to breathe.
28:56And I'm like, if I take my rag out, I'm going to breathe water, but like, I got to keep
28:59it in.
29:00And I'm sitting there trying to pull against a dead rag.
29:01I knew I couldn't pull anything, but I had to, because my body's trying to react to like,
29:04you need to breathe, dude.
29:05You need to breathe.
29:06So it's like, Oh my God, you know, nuts.
29:10And then hit the service.
29:11I'm 10 feet away from the boat because he'd been looking for me, dude.
29:15It was like pop and he's right there.
29:16You're so lucky.
29:17Oh dude.
29:18Everything about it.
29:19So lucky.
29:20Everything.
29:21So, uh, you know, pull it, pull myself over the boat, the guy on the boat's like, get
29:23out of the water.
29:24Get out the water.
29:25And obviously I can't get out the water.
29:26My arms don't work no more.
29:27This hand's broken.
29:28This arm's broken here.
29:30So like I couldn't pull myself up on the ladder.
29:31I could just hold onto it.
29:33So I was like, dude, you got to drag me in.
29:35He dragged me in and then we hauled out to the hospital and, and then all that craziness
29:39ensued afterwards.
29:40So it's like, yeah.
29:41Bad care.
29:42Yeah.
29:43Crazy bad care.
29:44Like I'd rather almost go against that gator twice and go back through that hospital system.
29:49Like I would take it twice.
29:50The pain was so much longer.
29:52Oh dude.
29:53So I was like drawn, drawn out, told that I deserved it.
29:55All this other shit.
29:56It was like that kind of stuff.
29:57So it was like, you know, and then treated like, Oh, you crazy white boy, you know, like
30:01you're a fool.
30:02You should have, you know, should have known better.
30:03Yeah.
30:04Yeah.
30:05And so that was kind of like, but for you, it's your job.
30:06And for me at this point, it's also, it's your job.
30:08Yeah.
30:09It's definitely your job.
30:10Yeah.
30:11So, and it was, dude, I've been as a, as a fossil hunter making a living doing it, it's,
30:17it's been four years of doing that.
30:18And so it's like, it's I'm all in.
30:20I mean, it's like, I couldn't not, you know, you have to have to be there.
30:25Yeah.
30:26So really hope you enjoyed these crazy stories.
30:29Definitely share it around.
30:30Cause we want to get the stories out.
30:32Hopefully we never have to go through something like that.
30:34If you want to learn more about will, like I said, his Instagram handle is in the description
30:39below.
30:40Check them out.
30:41He's got a lot of fossils and shark teeth for sale that he still risks his life for.
30:45If you want to check out shark co, we have apparel, my handmade shark teeth, Dory and
30:49our Megalodons.
30:50The link is in the description below as well.
30:54Sharkco.com.
30:55Check this out.
30:56This is a pretty accurate depiction of what I went through right here.