There was a very different kind of “Florida Man” story that took social media by storm on Tuesday. A viral video showed a man capturing an alligator with his garbage can, then he pushed it down a hill, where he released the six-foot-long reptile. The man who caught the gator is U.S. Army veteran Eugene Bozzi, 26, who decided he had to take action after seeing the alligator get close to his children and others in his Mount Dora neighborhood.
In the 50-second clip, Bozzi is seen pushing the trash can on the crowd as the alligator walks backward. He asked people watching him to let him know when he got the head of the gator inside the can. Once he did, Bozzi flipped over the cover, then pulled up the can. A second clip showed Bozzi pushing the can down a hill, towards the water. Bozzi then pushed the can over to let the alligator go before he ran back to his home.
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“Somebody’s gotta step up and do something, we all got to look out for each other right?” Bozzi, a Philadelphia native who has only lived in Florida for a year, told WESH. “I was frightened when I had it in it because it was so powerful. And I didn’t expect that, it was pushing out, whipping its tail around.” Bozzi said his Army training “kicked in” at the moment he captured the alligator. “I don’t know the procedures, so I did it my own way,” he said.
Bozzi’s children told him about the alligator, which he at first thought was a baby, he told USA Today. He was stunned when he saw how big it was and knew he had to do something to protect his children and other children. “The only thing that came to my mind was to protect my kids and the other children outside,” he said.
Bozzi is still shocked by the social media attention the video brought. “I got so many inboxes, DMs, women saying things, men saying things, people that I do know, friends,” he told WESH. Bozzi told USA Today he felt like he just did “what I was supposed to do at the time to make me feel more comfortable.”
After the video went viral, Orange County officials issued a “do not do this at home” warning. “Reminder: Alligators are not recyclable in your blue lid cart,” officials tweeted. Orange County officials asked residents to call the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s Nuisance Alligator Hotline, 866-FWC-GATOR (866-392-4286) if they see an alligator close to homes. Officials will send a contracted nuisance alligator trapper to capture the alligator. A nuisance alligator is “at least 4 feet in length and the caller believes it poses a threat to people, pets or property.”
