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Venomous Snake Bites 2 Students In E. Texas Class

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Oct 21, 2008 9:11 pm US/Central

Venomous Snake Bites 2 Students In E. Texas Class

Students Were Told To Bring Wild Animals To Class

They Thought It Was A Rat Snake Not Cottonmouth Water Moccasin

BIG SANDY (AP) ― Two high school students bitten by a venomous snake in science class are recovering at an East Texas hospital.

School officials in Big Sandy said Tuesday the students were bitten by a cottonmouth water moccasin their teacher had misidentified as non-venomous.

School Superintendent Scott Beene said students have been encouraged to bring in wild animals to be identified. While the teacher was leading the class in another science lab experiment, the two students were handling what they thought was a rat snake.

While they were handling the one snake, it began fighting with another and they were bitten. They told the teacher they had been bitten and were taken to the school nurse and then driven to a Tyler hospital.

Beene would not say which hospital or the exact condition of the students, citing they are both minors. However, he did say he believed both would remain hospitalized for several more days.

Beene said the snake that turned out to be a cottonmouth had been brought in earlier this year.

"I do not know how long that snake had been in the science lab, but the teacher evidently misidentified it as a non-venomous snake," he said.

Beene said school officials are working to make sure there isn't a repeat of Monday's incident.

"We are talking about how we will handle students bringing in wild animals, and I believe we will now safely transport the animal to the Tyler Zoo like we did the two snakes yesterday to be properly identified," he said. "I don't know if we will allow snakes back into any of our classrooms."

(© 2009 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

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