Dizzy carpet python spends week wrapped around car's air-conditioning fan

A carpet snake has survived a week-long ordeal after being trapped in the air-conditioning fan of an Australian woman's car.

Goat breeder and former Territory Minister Noel Padgham, 80, had been wondering what the strange noise was. "I heard it go clunketer, clunketer, clunketer," the Yarrawonga woman said.



Air-conditioning mechanic Kit Carson, 59, got in the car expecting to find the usual piece of paper - they tend to fall down the back of the glove box - but instead found a one-metre carpet python. "Him and I both got a jump," he said.

"He'd been spinning around like a bloody washing machine, but the end of his tail must have been hanging out - it was all feathered and ratty."



Mr Carson, of Cheaper Car Air-Conditioning, whipped the dazed fella into a bucket and took him to Yarrawonga's Ark Animal Hospital. The snake is now in better shape - although he is now a little shorter than when he arrived.

Vets were forced to amputate about 5cm of his chopped-up tail. But they expect the carpet python to make a full recovery.