Girl Rescues Friend Attacked by Alligator

After 14-year-old Edna Wilks was pulled underwater by an alligator, she surfaced with her arm still in the gator’s mouth. She began to pry at its jaws with her other hand. By the time the reptile let go, her friends had fled.

All but one. Her best friend, Amanda Valance, stayed behind and pulled her to shore as the gator followed.

“She saw his tail whipping around in the water and she told me she thought to herself she couldn’t let me die,” Edna said Monday from her hospital bed.

Edna received blood transfusions and underwent surgery to clean debris from the muscles of her broken arm.

If Amanda, also 14, hadn’t stayed, Edna is sure the alligator would have killed her. “We’ve been best friends for about 2 1/2 years and now she’s more than my best friend,” Edna said. “She’s my hero.”

The girls and four friends were floating on Boogie Boards in Little Lake Conway on Saturday night when an alligator grabbed Edna’s arm and pulled her underwater. She realized it was an alligator and started screaming. “He was spinning me in the water real fast and jerking me.”

She heard a loud crack as the gator snapped her arm bones. “I was thinking, ‘This is how I’m going to die. I’m going to drown in a minute.’ ”

After the spinning stopped, she surfaced and was able to take a deep breath, her arm still in the gator’s mouth. She began prying at the gator’s jaws and the animal finally let go.

By that time, the other children had fled for shore.

“For five split seconds, I felt like I had to leave, but I could not do that to her,” Amanda said. She stayed a couple of feet away throughout the attack. When Edna popped free, Amanda grabbed her and helped her onto a Boogie Board. Then she pulled the board to shore as the gator trailed behind.

“The alligator was still hanging around and followed them halfway to shore,” said Nancy Wilks, Edna’s mother. “The whole time Amanda was swimming she was thinking the alligator was going to get her feet.”

Alerted to the attack by two boys, Wilks ran out and saw Edna and Amanda on shore and an alligator floating among the abandoned Boogie Boards.

“I’m amazed that she’s even moving, that he didn’t kill her,” Wilks said. “I’ve never heard of anyone being pulled under and spinning and living to tell the tale. . . . They call it the ‘death spin,’ that tornado-like horizontal spin.” Alligators use the spin to kill larger prey.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission later killed two gators nearby, one 6 feet, 5 inches long, the other 11 feet, 2 inches. The larger gator was big enough to have killed someone, said Lt. Joy Hill, a commission spokeswoman.

“I’m very blessed,” Edna said. “I know that I wouldn’t be here right now without my friend.”