How did you manage to get stung up both legs to the knees? I grew up
in south Florida and had my share of red ant attacks and I have never
experiencedor seen them make it past your ankles before they all
start stinging so youstart shaking and brushing them off below your
shins. (now granted, it can be serious pain if many of them).
That’s a good question, and it’s a bit of a story. My wife and I
were visiting relatives in Florida and were taking a little side trip
down to the everglades. We were driving south on highway 29 (I
believe) south from Immokalee which runs straight as an arrow for
many miles, with no towns or side roads (a very tempting place to
drive fast) and one little bend in the highway near the south end.
We’re tooling along at about 60 mph with no other traffic, and I mean
no other cars, when suddenly I hear a siren and see a police car in
my rear view mirror blowing by me at over 100 mph, and right when we
are coming into the only bend in the road, where he couldn’t see if
there was anyone coming the other way. He tries to cut back in front
of me and begins to fishtail. He over corrects, fishtails the other
way and hits the guardrail on the left, bounces off that and shoots
off the road to the right across 50’ to 60’ feet of sand and scrub,
hits a dike with the car going straight up in the air and coming to
rest on the driver’s side on the top of the dike, siren still
screaming. This is all happening right in front of us, like a front
row seat in a movie.
I’m quite stunned by all of this, adrenalin pumping, hit the brakes
and pull over and stop on the side of the road. I realize that I have
to try to help this guy because we’re in the middle of nowhere and
there’s nobody else there and he could be bleeding or otherwise
seriously hurt. So I get out and run up to the car a bit cautiously
trying to smell for leaking gasoline, not wanting to be caught in a
fire. I can’t see the driver’s side because that side was down in the
sand, and was trying to decide whether I should climb up onto the
passenger side and try to lift the passenger door up and open to see
if I can help this guy. The siren keeps wailing away, I’m sucking a
lot of adrenalin and yelling to the driver hoping he is conscious,
but I get no answer. Suddenly another man comes running up to me. He
was driving a state parks truck north toward us and saw the accident
(I never saw him, being so focused on the cop’s car) came by, turned
around and radioed for help, which was a fair distance off. Sometime
later another cop car arrives with 2 cops in it and the 4 of us
manage to push the car back over onto its wheels. That’s right when
the ants, in a well coordinated attack started biting my legs from
the knees down simultaneously. I’m only wearing my 3 piece suit,
t-shirt, shorts and flip-flops so they got me good.
The wrecked cop car had dug up a number of ant hills and now they
were very angry.
I tried to rub them off and got back out on the highway, with my
legs on fire. Is this why they’re called fire ants? Now there were
other cop cars arriving and they took over the rescue, but, my wife
and I, being the closest witnesses had to wait to be interviewed by a
cop coming from another police force about 45 minutes away. It turned
out that a day and a half before a hunter had been reported missing
in the everglades and this cop was going to join in on the search. So
why was he going 100+ mph? Good question. The cop from another police
force who interviewed us failed to get our names, but because they
knew we were going to the little town of Everglades City they ran us
down and got our names. I was curious to follow up and find out what
happened to the officer who wrecked the car, but it was as if it
never happened. No reports in the papers or on the radio or
television. It looks like one cop was not going to bust another for
unnecessary speeding.
A few days later my legs were ok.
Dennis Fisher