When he was ten years old, Albert Killian started removing snakes from his neighbor’s yard, and he has loved them ever since. Now at 60, he has been bitten over a hundred times, but by this point, he already has a tolerance to their deadly venom.
Scroll down for video
This is hardly surprising, considering that today, Killian is a sort of Montgomery, as he now has a collection of 28 Egyptian cobras, three Indian cobras, some forest cobras, spitting cobras, rattlesnakes, and vipers (although it is highly doubtful that he has an incredibly friendly viper, though).
Killian extracts venom from his snakes, which he then processes into pharmaceutical products. The Florida resident shared, “These animals can kill you in the blink of an eye, it’s one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. Over the years I have built a tolerance for the venom by taking so many bites.”
He added, “I’ve taken mamba bites and I’ve been bitten in the arm by a cobra. There was enough venom to probably drop an 8,000-pound elephant. The fact that I’ve taken five Mamba bites and I never needed anti-venom boggles my mind.”
His fascination with these deadly reptiles started when he was a child and made it a point to save all the snakes in the community. He said, One day I was going to school and saw a snake on the side of the road. When I ran home and told my uncle he went up the road and shot it, which was really upsetting. I went into shock. I felt like these animals had a bad deal and I felt that I had to save all the snakes in the neighborhood.”
He started saving snakes by collecting them in containers, garbage cans, and barrels, and kept them in the garage. Soon enough, the neighbors started paying him to remove the terrors from their own backyards.
But that wasn’t the end of it for Albert. He recalled, “After that I started doing shows for schools, the boy scouts, and other organizations. I then started to get into film and started using my animals for television.”
Still, it does not mean that handling animals and being immune to their venom could keep him alive. In fact, he almost died trying to handle a Southeast Asian Suphan Cobra once. “The thing nailed me and I had 20 minutes to get to the hospital and no ambulance could take me. I drove to the hospital and flat lined there for like two or three minutes. The venom put me in respiratory failure,” Albert narrated.
The near-death experience did not put him off the deadly animals, though, and he still continues on handling and taking care of them. Some of the snakes he now owns come from private owners from around the world, however, he does receive many of them from the US Fish and Wildlife Service.