…The most common venomous bite was from the arboreal white-lipped bamboo viper, but such a bite was never lethal for an American soldier (Berlinger and Flowers 1973) (fig. By Scarecrow52 Available in English and Spanish. Not to mention that although “only” one out of four people may die from a rattlesnake bite (in this age of modern medicine) that statistic ignores the number of bite victims that lose digits or whole limbs to tissue damage. Description Maximum total length males 600 mm, females 810 mm; maximum tail length males 120 mm, females 130 mm. They hurt like hell. Despite claims to the contrary, tigers will scavenge and feed at old kills, be they their own, or someone else’s. (It’s so pathetic to see Bond “menaced” by a tarantula in Dr No. So, if the enemy searches inside these backpacks, they would be bitten. Whether you consider their fears valid is a separate issue and not one that is arguable one way or the other. Everyone “knew” scorpions, black widow spiders, tarantulas and rattle snakes were all instant death machines. Now, it's bad enough to be burdened with the knowledge of such a creature, much less to have … Powered by Discourse, best viewed with JavaScript enabled. Were snakes a big problem for soldiers in Vietnam? And on top of that, they used photo tricks - Connery wasn’t even in the scene with the spider.). Snake pits or Viper trap. Did medics carry anti-venom? The males have hemipenes that are short and spinose beyond the bifurcation.. There are 9–11 upper labials, of which the first are separated from nasal scales by a distinct suture. When the Bamboo was released, so was the snake – right onto the enemy. While one would have to be a very extreme wildlife enthusiast, to welcome being killed and eaten by a tiger in the course of going about one’s business: I cannot but feel sad about the current situation. Snake pits were a special kind of animal booby trap. Did we lose soldiers due to snake bites? Check out some brown recluse bites for additional hilarity. And tarantulas were never fatal. Almost all of the persons questioned had heard of the “cigarette snakes” (when you are bitten you only have time for one cigarette); or the “two-step snake” (no explanation necessary), but were not cognizant that only one snakebite death had occurred in US forces since United States involvement there. Props to Australia - they have none of those deadly species :D. …The most common venomous bite was from the arboreal white-lipped bamboo viper …*. They got the reputation because people died from them. Yes, this is exactly what it sounds like. People had good reason to develop fear of venomous creatures. Stories from Vietnam: That mostly hold true in the United States were there is only one medically significant scorpion and that only barely makes it over the border - mostly it is an issue in Arizona. Rattlesnakes - yeah they can be fatal. One out of four. I totally understand the need for intensive therapy. American soldiers were most afraid of this kind of trap. Pre-antibiotics, the open sore from such bites was, alone, an invitation to death by sepsis. That’s interesting, because I had always heard tales of the deadly “two step” snakes. Soldiers from rattlesnake infested areas in the United States harbored little fear of these reptiles but were deathly afraid of the "bamboo vipers" of Vietnam. Common names include Asian palm pit vipers, Asian lanceheads and Asian lance-headed vipers. The first stories illustrate some of the many tiger encounters experienced in during the Vietnamese war. Never. NEVER get out of the boat! Soldiers from rattlesnake infested areas in the United States harbored little fear of these reptiles but were deathly afraid of the “bamboo vipers” of Vietnam. But elsewhere ( like the Pacific coast of Mexico ) there is a slightly more diverse crew of nasty actors. The Indochinese tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) is a tiger population native to Southeast Asia. I’m sure there were plenty of venomous snakes in the area. ARBOREAL? In certain cases, yes, bites and stings can be fatal. Trimeresurus stejnegeri grows to a maximum total length of 75 centimetres (30 in), which includes a tail length of 14.5 centimetres (5.7 in). Trimeresurus albolabris, the white-lipped pit viper, is a venomous pit viper species endemic to Southeast Asia. There has NEVER been a recorded death from a tarantula. You mean like, I’d be walking along and poisonous snakes would drop down onto me out of the trees? Having developed a taste for human flesh they would then attack soldiers quite readily. From the reference above apparently fear of snakebite was pronounced, but all out of proportion to its actual occurrence or lethality. It has been listed as Endangered on the IUCN Red List since 2008, as the population seriously declined and approaches the threshold for Critically Endangered. I was just wondering if snakes were a huge problem for soldiers in the jungles of Vietnam. Black widow and scorpion bites are rarely fatal in healthy adults. How did these creatures ever get that reputation? Similarly, it’d be interesting to read accounts from the Communist side about animal encounters along the Vietnam/Laos/Cambodia border region. :eek: :eek: I’ll take my chances with the snakes. Tangentially related, there was an interesting Cracked article recently about Vietnam, from the point-of-view of an enemy combatant. You belong to a special ops group (SOG). The same sort of vipers was used inside rat tunnels tied to bamboo sticks. Here’s another site with aceplace57’s account, this time with pictures of the critter. Weirdly, if you’d asked me before I looked it up, I’d have thought that Russell’s Viper would’ve been the big killer and that the King Cobra, like the Spectacled Cobra, (Naja naja) would’ve only been found in India and Sri Lanka. People learned to fear them because of painful, disfiguring, not infrequently lethal bites. But horses and cows are not considered lethal killing machines of the west like scorpions and black widows. Interesting that there was no such thing! The Vietcong often carried bamboo green pit vipers in backpacks. Nah, Vietnam may be a buggy, snake-infested hellhole, but it’s no Australia. Russell’s isn’t native to Vietnam, though the wiki states that it’s being found there more and more often. But, so can getting trampled by a ornery cow, or kicked by a horse. IIRC the only one of these native to Asia is the Krait (there are other species whose untreated bites kill well over half the victims). Description: You participate in a secret operation to attack the Ho Chi Minh route. You will always have much longer to live than two steps, but there are several species of snakes in the world whose bites are close to 100% fatal without antivenin. Tiger attacks increased during the Vietnam war; this was due to the frequency with which bodies lay unburied. 14 minutes from question to answer. The Bamboo Viper is an ambush predator that will wait in a single position ready to strike. The bamboo pit viper of Vietnam is chock full of hemotoxic venom, which works by disrupting the blood's clotting process, destroying red blood cells, and wreaking havoc on your organ tissues.They were known as three-step snakes, because that's as far as you'd make it after getting bit by one. This population occurs in Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and southwestern China. Emphasis added. Korean tiger is supposedly making a comeback, Studies indicated only 25-50 snakebite incidents occurred annually in US forces. Of these, only a few necessitated intensive therapy…. In addition, some number of bite/sting victims were allergic and died due to anaphylaxis, for which there also was no effective treatment until recently. Absolutely goddamn right! It would appear from the above, that the Indochinese variety of the tiger is highly endangered: doing – very relatively – better in Thailand and Myanmar, than in the three countries of Indochina proper, where it is teetering on the edge of extinction. Scorpion stings are not pleasant, a black widow bite can make you so sick that you hope for death, but generally you won’t die from either. Generally not prone to give chase but will hold their ground if they feel cornered. People have varying levels of sensitivity to venom and there were no genuinely effective treatments until relatively recently.

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