Searchers looking for a missing woman in Indonesia were horrified when she was found eaten alive by a giant snake.
Mum-of-four Farida, who’s surname hasn’t been made public, disappeared while walking to her local market in Kalempang, Indonesia, on Thursday.
Her husband Noni raised the alarm when she didn’t return home that evening, launching a search party alongside other locals.
The party found a 20ft long python in the undergrowth on Friday with a huge bulge in its stomach – and fearing the worst, they cut through the reptile’s stomach with a machete.
Farida was found in the snake’s gut. It appeared the python had bitten her leg before coiling around her, suffocating her before it swallowed her head first.
Graphic pictures and video, which we’ve chosen not to publish, show Farida’s body as she was removed from the snake’s stomach and taken to be prepared for a religious burial.
Noni said: ‘I am forever sorry that I let my wife go out alone. If I had been with her that day, the snake would not have dared to touch her.
‘I feel sorry for the suffering she went through. I am sorry for our family.’
Suardi Rosi, head of their home village, said: ‘The victim’s husband looked for his wife in the nearby forest area because she had not been home for a day.
‘He found a snake with a large stomach. He immediately suspected that his wife had been eaten by the python.
‘Several other villages then helped him to catch the python. The body of his wife was found in the stomach of a snake. She was taken away to his house before being buried.
‘This has not happened before in our village. We have warned everybody to be careful when they walk through the woods. Women should be accompanied by someone.’
Indonesia has a large population of wild pythons in its vast and dense jungle, where they can thrive. Unlike in neighbouring countries in Southeast Asia, urban developments have not limited their growth.
The last documented case of a human being eaten by a python was in 2022, also in Indonesia.
In that case, Jahrah, 54, disappeared while collecting rubber from a plantation in Jambi province before horrified locals found a giant python stretched out in a clearing among trees with a large bulge in its tummy two days later on October 23.