When 16-year-old Onya Lee-Golightly heard that a snake slithered into a backyard in her South Florida neighborhood, she knew she had to help.
The animal and reptile enthusiast was first alerted of the snake by her dad, Daniel Golightly, who saw a posting about it on their community's Ring app. The pair set out to the house together, which is where they realized it was a python.
Daniel said that when he first saw the snake, he realized it was pretty big, and had his reservations. But his daughter was unfazed by the 11-foot reptile — "I should probably just grab it from the head," Daniel recalled her saying in an Instagram video.
And that's exactly what Onya did, as she swiftly latched onto the python's head and hauled the snake toward a bag she planned to use for its transport.
@onyas_animal_adventures / Instagram
The snake wrapped around Onya's arms several times, winding tightly as she tried to carefully guide it into the bag.
Daniel helped wrestle the python with his daughter, and said it also wrapped around his arm once.
"It wrapped around my arm and let me tell you, the pressure was unlike anything I've felt," said Daniel.
He said he was amazed at his daughter, who only seemed to care about the snake's wellbeing rather than her own discomfort, even though the python had wrapped around her arms more times than his.
"He’s squeezing my hand which is squeezing his neck, and I don’t want to hurt him," Onya had said while intertwined with the snake.
It took about eight minutes to wrangle the python into the bag, Onya told Scripps News.
"I've never in my life seen a young 16-year-old girl do something like this in my life," Daniel said.
Onya documents her love of animals and reptiles on her Instagram and Youtube channel. One of her missions is to help people overcome their fears with misunderstood animals.
