DARWIN, Australia (AP) — April 22, 2013 — A French fisherman was bloodied but back on his fishing boat Monday, just hours after he escaped from the jaws of a young saltwater crocodile who attacked him while swimming along a remote stretch of Australia’s northern coast.
Yoann Galeran, 29, said he was swimming from shore to a dinghy about 15 meters (50 feet) away on Sunday night when a crocodile between 2 meters (6 feet 7 inches) and 2.5 meters (8 feet 2 inches) clamped down on his head and neck and attempted to drown him in a maneuver known as a death roll.
‘‘It went straight away to the top of my head and diving under the water he tried to do that spinning thing,’’ Galeran said, referring to the drowning maneuver.
‘‘It was going so fast — everything happened in less than five seconds and then I fell free,’’ he added. ‘‘I'm very lucky.’’
‘‘If it was a bit bigger crocodile, I wouldn’t be talking to you now,’’ he said.
Fishing boat skipper Craig van Lawick said he thought Galeran, an Australian resident born in the southeastern French city of Avignon, was joking about being attacked by a crocodile until he saw the blood.
Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Boston Globe