No, really I'm fine.
Posted on 10/23/2024 4:34:04 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Three people are recovering after being attacked by a swarm of bees in a San Diego community earlier this week.
One of the victims was reportedly stung hundreds of times.
A Ring camera video captured the chaos after a swarm of bees attacked a woman at Fairbrook Park in Scripps Ranch.
“A woman who was kind of stumbling down the street, and I mean engulfed in bees, like a foot in front of her, back all over head to toe,” said Dana Meerschart, who called 911.
Meerschart said she saw the aftermath of the attack and rushed to try to help after the woman being stung asked her for water.
“Obviously, I couldn’t, like, get to her. I couldn’t help, which was like the hardest part of it all because you see her. She’s then now collapsed in front of my house,” Meerschart said.
A neighbor who’s speaking on behalf of the woman and her family said it’s estimated she was stung 400 times, 100 times on her scalp alone, saying doctors stopped counting.
Two other people were also stung, including a man who tried to help her.
Neighbors said the bees attacked after an exterminator hit the hive, agitating the bees.
“Kids are playing in this park all the time. It could have easily been my child, my neighbor’s child, and I just feel terrible for this poor woman,” Meerschart said.
Thursday, several bees still lingered at the site where the hive once was.
The area is still blocked off with warning signs.
The woman, according to the neighbor speaking on the family’s behalf, was visiting from Israel. She is now out of the hospital recovering and on medication.
“That was probably the hardest thing of just trying to figure out how to help this poor woman,” Meerschart said.
The pest control company has not responded to a request for comment.
I can’t believe she survived. What a fortunate woman to survive that ordeal.
I wonder what such a massive dose of bee venom does to your allergies and immune system. I hope she doesn’t have long-term effects.
Yes, I wonder what the long term impact is. I wonder if they were attracted to something about her?
No, really I'm fine.
Well, we all know what kind of bees they were, and where they came from (/s)
Get this: COVID is exacerbated by the progression of thrombosis, disseminated intravascular coagulation, and cytokine storms.
Clinical Case Reports
2022 Jan 25;10(1):e05303. doi: 10.1002/ccr3.5303
Fatal outcome following multiple bee stings: A rare case
Authors: Mahdi Fakhar, Zakaria Zakariaei, Ali Sharifpour, Mostafa Soleymani, Ashkan Zakariaei
One sting can do you in if you are allergic,
I am glad the woman lived.
I used to have quite a few hives of honeybees. I worked with my bees almost daily, and they were used to me and I didn’t have to wear any protection.
One day I discovered that a bear had knocked over several of my hives. I didn’t even have a shirt on, but I ran down and tried to set the hives back upright. Those bees ate me up. I had many stings.
I also used to go collect swarms of bees. People would call me. When bees are swarming, they are extremely gentle. I would pick them up in my hands, but them in a cardboard box, and take them home to give them a hive to live in. People called me from all over two counties to get swarms that landed on their properties.
Of course the publication is not going to tell us what kind of bees they are. But I am guessing Killer bees.
If the hive was disturbed, they probably went for anything that moved. I’ve been in mating swarms, unprotected, and had no problems.
So, because the bear knocked them over, they were excited, so they bit you, even though they normally wouldn’t have?
There’s a guy that videos swarms, removals etc. called Mr & Mrs Bee Rescue & most of the time he’s in a t-shirt. I recall one removal he was 2-3 stories up on a roof & he was fully covered in gear & he was screaming at the people on the ground to take cover because of the aggressiveness of the hive he was removing. Crazy stuff to watch.
I like bees.
I went to a bed and breakfast in Vermont where the guy kept bees, and I am interested, so after asking a bunch of questions, he asked if I wanted to help him do something with the hive...of course I did! I had a blast. He said the key was to be slow and deliberate. And calm. If I lived where I could have a few hives, I absolutely would.
I did have an interesting interaction with bumblebees one time. Different from honeybees, to be sure!
I have a shed out in my backyard, and one day while working around it, I noticed the large black bumblebee types landing on the concrete ramp, and walking under the large sliding door into the shed.
That usually isn’t a good sign, and sure enough, when I watched one land, it walked under a table with a bunch of stuff piled around it, I saw a large dome on the floor, about 2 feet by two feet, and the bumblebee walked right into it.
It looked kind of like a mouse nest.
Now, those large, mostly black bumblebees looked nasty with a visible stinger on them that looked to me like it stuck out a quarter inch from their abdomen, so I went inside, and had one of those helmets with the netting on it, put on a pair of woolen german army pants that had a plastic liner over a pair of sweatpants, put on a heavy jacket, used duct tape around my pant legs and jacket cuffs over heavy leather gloves, and had the jacket zipped all the way up with the netting tucked inside. It felt impenetrable.
So, I grabbed a large, thick, heavy duty garbage bag, a small rake, and walked up to the thing where I could hear a faint buzzing inside.
I poked it gently with the rake, and heard the buzzing volume increase dramatically. I stepped back and pondered it, wondering why I felt so damned nervous...as covered up as I was.
I screwed up my courage, opened the bag on the ground, held it open with my legs, and took the rake to scoop the whole nest inside.
I put the rake behind it and moved the whole thing about an inch, and it erupted with a really, REALLY loud, ANGRY buzzing...and the entire nest visibly VIBRATED!
LOL, I left it alone and called some guys who advertised themselves as “The Bee Guys”. They showed up in a beat up red pickup, and got out wearing white coveralls and ZZ-Top style beards...they looked to be crittery guys in their mid-sixties!
They went out back and came back about a minute later, no other protective gear, and had the nest in a large black garbage bag...I think we paid them $75 and they left us a jar of honey...:) When we asked what they did with the bees, one laconically said “We just kill em, they ain’t good for honey or nuthin’ anyway...”
Remember years ago the ads in the back of magazines about bees curing arthritis? And bee pollen?
They still pollinate. Better than mosquitoes, and who wants them around.
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