‘I felt teeth pierce my skull.’ Florida firefighter describes horrifying gator attack

A shape materializes in the dark green lake and makes a beeline toward the swimmer.

The water, thick with algae, turns to swirling white bubbles as the two shapes thrash about before the swimmer desperately heads back toward land.

The video of the alligator attack on the swimmer on Aug. 3 was captured by a drone hovering above Lake Thonotossa, about 20 miles northeast of Tampa, Florida.

But the drone video isn’t the only evidence of the attack, because the swimmer, 34-year-old Juan Carlos La Verde, lived to tell the tale.

“I felt the teeth clamp down and instantly realized it was a gator,” La Verde recounted in a post written by his friend, Bill Berry, and shared on his Facebook page. “ My entire head and upper chest were inside her mouth.”

La Verde, who goes by “JC Defeats,” went for a swim to film a promotional video for his outdoor adventure and motivational company, DefeatX.

As he swam toward the middle of the lake, his friend flew the drone overhead. He made it about 350 yards before the 12-foot gator appeared.

“Then she bit down and I felt the teeth pierce my flesh,” his Facebook post reads. “There was a loud popping sound, then instinct took over.”

La Verde grabbed the tip of the reptile’s snout and pulled, but it bit down again.

“I felt teeth pierce my skull,” he said in the post, before he and the animal rolled, doing a “full 360.”

“I reached my hands into her mouth and I remember feeling her scales and also her teeth,” the post says. “I was surprised that the teeth were not that sharp, not like (shark’s) teeth, more like ours but pointier.”

When the two were upside down in the water, the alligator let him go and he swam for a nearby dock. After hoisting himself onto the platform, he saw he was bleeding, followed by searing pain.

“It was unbearable, like a migraine radiating from the back of my eyes and shooting out the bottom of my jaw,” the post says. “I realized that the popping sound I’d heard earlier was my jaw breaking.”

Alligator attacks are rare in Florida, though this year there have been two deaths reported in the state, according to USA Today. Two people have also died in South Carolina in alligator attacks.

Last year nine people received alligator bites in Florida, seven of them serious but none fatal, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

‘It has given me a different perspective’

La Verde, who is also a firefighter and paramedic for the Oldsmar Fire Rescue Department, said his next thought was that he had to let his friend know he was OK. He started walking away from the lake and found himself in someone’s backyard, where he tried to cover his face so young children playing outside wouldn’t see his wounds.

The kids ran to get their mother, who told La Verde that first responders had been sent to the lake where he had started his swim. They started to drive him to the site as La Verde clutched a blood-soaked towel over his head, and as they faced obstacles like a closed gate blocking the road and tall grass slowing down the car.

He finally decided to walk the rest of the way to his friend, which felt like a “marathon,” the post reads. He and his friend flushed his wounds and put on bandages and trauma dressing from a first-aid kit until an ambulance arrived.

Rescue crews took him to Tampa General Hospital, according to Fox 13. There, he underwent six hours of surgery, according to his Facebook post.

Speaking by phone on Thursday, Aug. 18 from his home in Brandon, about 15 miles east of Tampa, La Verde told McClatchy News that he wants the focus of his story to be on resiliency and motivation, values that are the foundation of his/ company, DefeatX, which focuses on inspiring people to challenge themselves and overcome their struggles.

“Our team aims to harness sportsmanship, adventure, and fun to win these personal battles and overcome adversity,” the company website reads.

La Verde, who said he served with the U.S. Air Force before becoming a firefighter and has completed multiple races and Ironman triathlons, said he is used to challenging himself. But this challenge, forced on him by a 12-foot alligator, has presented a new test.

“It has given me a different perspective,” he said, speaking in a half-mumble through his wired-shut jaw.

‘This shouldn’t stop you from swimming’

Besides having his face and jaw reconstructed, he also underwent a craniotomy, a surgery in which a bone flap is removed from the skull so surgeons can access the brain, his wife, Christine La Verde, told McClatchy News. Surgeons removed part of his temporal lobe because a fractured bone had punctured his brain, she said. He is now wearing a helmet to protect his head and is dealing with some facial paralysis due to a severed nerve.

Although he had to be readmitted to the hospital for a few days after a fall, his wife said he is recovering well. She said she expects that the wires in his jaw will be able to be cut within the next few weeks, allowing him to eat solid food again.

“Gator bites may be his first meal,” she said, chuckling.

But it will still be months of resting and staving off infection before doctors can perform another surgery to put a plate over his brain, she said.

Despite the arduous recovery ahead, she said her husband remains strong and has gained a new perspective on how to overcome hardship.

“He just wants to inspire others to adventure, get outside, swim, bike, run, whatever you can do to just get up and go,” she said.

La Verde said he doesn’t want anyone to let fear hold them back from going after their dreams.

“The world is a really dark, challenging place that is filled with metaphorical alligators everywhere,” he said, “and this shouldn’t stop you from swimming.”

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