30-05-2025
Heavily pregnant woman is dragged to her death by crocodile after it swam into her flooded home
A heavily pregnant woman was killed by a crocodile while cooking lunch at her flooded home in Indonesia.
Munirah, 28, was standing in the swamped kitchen when the animal sank its fangs into her leg in North Kalimantan on Tuesday.
The mother-to-be, who was only identified by her first name, screamed as the beast then tried to thrash her in a death roll.
Hearing her pained cries, Munirah's sister Ana Maria rushed over and found her sibling holding onto a tree branch.
She rushed out of the room to find a weapon with which to beat the huge animal, but it had already dragged Munirah into the water by the time she returned.
Villagers searched along the Mambulu River. Footage shows several men firing a shotgun at the predator, but it retreated into the muddy waters.
Around half an hour later, they found a lifeless Munirah body floating in the flood.
Local police chief AKP Supriadi said: 'The victim died after being attacked by a crocodile. She was dragged away from her kitchen and drowned to death.
'She couldn't be saved. She was eight months pregnant and did not have the strength to fight off the crocodile.
'The crocodile released her, but she was already dead when her body surfaced.'
The local disaster response agency (BPBD) confirmed the incident.
Hasanuddin, head of the BPBD Rescue Division in Nunukan Regency, said: 'Yes, we received the report. The official documentation will be included in our daily report at 6.00 pm'.
Munirah's residence was a stilt home flooded after the nearby Mambulu River burst its banks following heavy rain.
Authorities suspect that the flood has caused crocodiles to move closer to human settlements, increasing the risk of attacks.
Residents have been warned to stay vigilant, especially when carrying out activities near rivers or flood-prone zones.
The Indonesian archipelago is home to 14 types of crocs - with a large population of extremely large and violent estuarine crocodiles that flourish in the region's climate.
Conservationists believe that crocodiles have been driven further inland closer to villages due to overfishing reducing the crocodiles' natural food supplies combined with habitat loss from the development of coastal areas into farms.
Widespread tin mining has also caused villagers to encroach on the crocodiles' natural habitats, pushing the creatures closer toward people's homes.
Last year alone there were 179 recorded crocodile attack victims in Indonesia, the highest number of crocodile attacks in the world, with 92 fatalities, according to CrocAttack, an independent database.
Residents and experts have called for better government interventions to stop the problem from getting even worse.
The saltwater crocodile has been a legally protected species in Indonesia since 1999, making it an animal that cannot be hunted freely.
As a top predator, there is also no population control in nature.
Social media videos showing crocodile appearances and attacks in Sulawesi and other regions in Indonesia are also on the rise.
Only last week a 13-year-old boy was killed by a crocodile in front of his friends as he tried to retrieve a football.
Muhammad Syahputra Almanda was playing with his friends in a field next to their village in Jambi on Saturday.
He had chased after the ball towards a nearby river, but was snatched by a huge 13ft crocodile as he bent down to scoop it up.
'He asked his friend to throw the ball into the water, and after it was thrown. He jumped in but he didn't resurface,' police said.
'Soon after, witnesses saw him in the jaws of a crocodile.'
