Read Online Surviving the Extremes: A Doctor's Journey to the Limits of Human Endurance by Kenneth Kamler - Free Book Online Page B

told me the terrifying story of an encounter Antonio had had with a snake many years earlier while working for some geologists from an oil company. His job was to guide and protect the vulnerable strangers who, like us, had no chance of surviving on their own. They were carrying out the kind of work that was destroying his homeland, but Antonio saw no conflict. He had learned from his ancestors that the environment always recovered, and had seen this for himself his entire life. He didn’t realize that this time he was opening the door to a civilization with far more destructive force than anything he could imagine.
    One cool night in that tiny jungle-encircled oil camp, Antonio was asleep on the floor of his tent, wearing loose clothes and lying on his back between two blankets. He was awakened by some wriggling around his ankle followed by the unmistakable sensation of a snake slithering up his leg inside his pants. He felt its full weight as it coiled up to rest on his stomach. Reflexively, Antonio pulled the blanket off, but the snake was under his T-shirt. Snakes are cold-blooded, meaning that their body temperature depends on their surroundings, and on cool nights pit vipers have been known to enter tents in search of warmth. A pit beneath each eye acts as a long-range infrared heat sensor, easily able to detect the warmth coming out of a tent. With its ability to distinguish temperature variations as small as 1°F between its right and left pit, the snake can target any heat source and home in on its warmest part; in this case, Antonio’s stomach, just below his heart. The snake had only been seeking a comfortable place to rest and had no intention of biting him. But snakes, though deaf, are exquisitely sensitive to motion or vibration. Antonio knew that if he changed position or called out, the snake would interpret it as an attack. If it were going to strike, it would lift its head up, as if cocking its upper body, before plunging its fangs forward and down faster than the eye can see.
    The snake remained motionless. For hours, Antonio lay on his back watching the bulge covered by his T-shirt, afraid to either moveor yell for help—afraid to see the T-shirt start to tent up from below. Just after sunrise, the tent and the snake began to heat up. Soon the snake became uncomfortable and started moving around. At last Antonio felt it slide slowly past his thigh, down his other leg, and out over his foot. He waited a few more seconds before he dared to get up, and when he did, the snake was gone. He never saw it.
    Later I asked Antonio what kind of snake he thought it was. He believes it was a small Cascabel—a deadly poisonous pit viper. He said it was about 3 feet long and very heavy. Its scales felt rough against his skin, and it was black and gray. I asked him how he knew it was black and gray if he never saw it.
    “I see it in my dreams,” he replied.
    I wondered if he was thinking about that when he told me that snake heads cast bad spells. For me, and for most people, simply looking at a snake is enough to elicit a mixture of chills, fear, and revulsion—a dramatic, but not altogether inappropriate, survival response, considering that poisonous snakes kill over one hundred thousand people per year, roughly half of them in India. No wonder some Indian religions worship snakes as gods to be feared.
    Poisonous snakes are highly evolved killing machines. Their venom is a special saliva formed in glands behind their jaws. During the bite, the glands contract, squeezing the venom forward into the fangs, which are hollow teeth with holes at the pointy ends. The system is very much like an injection with a hypodermic needle.
    Venom is a complex potion, not easy for a snake to produce. Therefore the snake has to use it sparingly, and only for very good reason. While the snake will always inject venom into prey, when biting defensively it may or may not envenomate its assumed attacker. It first quickly assesses the