A woman walking her dog on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina fell victim to a fatal alligator attack on Tuesday morning, July 4.
This incident marks the second lethal encounter with an alligator in Beaufort County within a year.
The Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office responded to a distress call around 9:30 am regarding a potential alligator attack near a lagoon located by a golf course in the Spanish Wells community. Upon arrival, authorities discovered an unresponsive 69-year-old resident at the edge of the lagoon.
The rescue efforts were impeded by the presence of an alligator, which appeared to be guarding the woman’s body. However, swift action was taken to safely remove the alligator from the area, allowing the body to be recovered.
Investigators determined that the victim had been walking her dog, which was found unharmed, earlier that morning when the alligator attacked. The Beaufort County Coroner’s Office will conduct an autopsy to determine the precise cause of the woman’s death.
In response to the incident, the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources dispatched biologists and officers to the scene promptly.
This incident follows a similar tragedy in Beaufort County less than a year ago when an 88-year-old woman from Sun City was killed by an alligator attack near her home on August 15.
It’s noteworthy that fatal alligator attacks were unprecedented in South Carolina until recently. However, in 2020, deputies were forced to fatally shoot an alligator responsible for the death of a 58-year-old woman on Kiawah Island. In 2019, a man was found deceased on Kiawah Island with what authorities believed to be alligator bite marks, though the cause of his death remained unclear. There were also attacks recorded in 2016 and 2018.
Prior to these incidents, South Carolina had never documented a fatality resulting from an alligator attack.
