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When Crocodiles Attack: The Ramree Island Massacre (2013)
- Swoerd 2y agoWouldn't climbing even a relatively low tree essentially guarantee that a croc couldn't get to you? This story sounds made up.
- t-3 2y agoMangroves aren't large or particularly tall or strong trees. Climbing one to sleep in would be difficult for even a child let alone a large group of adult men.
- rightbyte 2y agoSeems like a made up story?
- itsanaccount 2y agoAnd in England there are people who fight against those who are trying to restore the forest, because the island has clearly always been rolling hills of soft pasture. edit: for the inevitable "i dont get it" https://www.washington.edu/news/2017/11/15/what-counts-as-nature-it-all-depends/ https://www.washington.edu/news/2017/11/15/what-counts-as-na... https://www.britishecologicalsociety.org/younger-generation-fail-to-notice-environmental-decline-due-to-generational-amnesia-risking-conservation-longevity/ https://www.britishecologicalsociety.org/younger-generation-... There's a reason Man vs Nature is a fundamental literary conflict even if we've long since pacified and destroyed the land around us.
- RealityVoid 2y agoReally? That's... strange. How often is that sentiment? Is it because of some economic factor I'm not seeing?
- KineticLensman 2y agoA lot of highlands in the UK support large grouse shooting estates and / or sheep farming. They are wildlife deserts unless you are the sort of wildlife that supports a vested-interests business.
- thebruce87m 2y ago> England there are people who fight against those who are trying to restore the forest, because the island England isn’t an island, it shares land borders with Scotland and Wales.
- worthless-trash 2y agoSo, "maybe". I feel like i'm in a unique position to talk about this. My family has been involved in crocodiles in one way or another since the 1950's, from a close family being eaten, to working in their preservation and tourism. Crocodiles are definitely a high level predator. Mangrove swamps make an ideal breeding and hunting grounds for pubestant crocodiles. Each male crocodile will consider humans (and other animals) a challenge to its territory. When they have an opportunity to overpower a threat, they will do so and drown their prey and stashing the corpse under a log usually under water. These humans would likely be forced to sleep in the mangroves, the British had control of the non mangrove areas forcing them directly into the territory of the crocodiles, the humans in the dark and asleep would EASILY be taken and drowned. My uncle (deceased last year) tells me of the time when my family friend was taken by a local crocodile. She was knee deep in the water, splashing herself with the water on a hot new years night, the other party goers around heard a splash and not even a chance of a scream. Imagine this when you are 500 strong, in a thick area of crocodiles with mangrove swamp blocking noise. I can't bring myself to watch narration on the story but ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-s4lrLtMjwA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-s4lrLtMjwA ) is supposed to be pretty accurate. Its possible that I'm doxing myself and a clever person maybe can figure out my family from this. This is one crocodile, with a territory size of about 200m. Imagine this across an mangrove area of the island, while you are hunted, tired and can't hear your team. The worse part is, the japanese soldiers probably were not aware of the existence and the the sheer number of crocodiles in Ramree, it is a recipe for disaster. If the crocodiles didn't kill them, the bites and infections from them likely would.
- B1FF_PSUVM 2y ago> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-s4lrLtMjwA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-s4lrLtMjwA ) is supposed to be pretty accurate There is a good point in a comment there - at the time crocodiles were not expected: """ @thebackwardpointinggodwit8080 1 year ago To all those people saying how could someone swim in waters with all those crocs around? Well the bit this account misses is that for many years crocs had been hunted to near extinction in that area and right across the north of Australia. Croc attack had become just a distant possibility in the most remote of locations. Then croc hunting was outlawed in the 70s and croc numbers recovered quickly and their distribution moved southwards to include places like the Daintree over the next decade or so. No-one really expected to see big crocs in the Daintree in the early 80s and what these people did was normal and considered not dangerous at the time. I was in Australia at the time and I remember when that attack happened - it didn’t seem possible. I and most people thought it was much more likely that she simply drowned or disappeared - or maybe some foul-play had occurred and people were covering it up - but we were very skeptical that it was a croc. Now crocs are common right across the north of Australia and sadly attacks keep happening, but Beryl Wruck just had the misfortune to be the first person to find out the hard way that things had changed and what everyone considered safe no longer was. """
- thrwwy001 2y ago[dead]
- ForOldHack 2y agoConfirmed, even though there was a lot of research going nowhere... " According to Hickey (1998), "the Japanese were forced into one corner of the island where, among the crocodile-infested swamps, most of them died from poor internet reception. most of them died from drowning, disease or starvation. Only 20 surrendered."
- worthless-trash 2y agoInternet reception ?
- rightbyte 2y agoI think it is a mangled joke?
- whycome 2y agoReported in papers at home. Maybe this was one of the seeds that led to Godzilla.
- thrwwy001 2y agoNeither this fanciful story nor the crocodiles had anything to do with gozilla. Godzilla ( gojira in japanese ) is a result of joining two japanese words - gorira ( gorilla ) and kujira ( whale ). The impetus for the creation of godzilla were the genocidal firebombings and nukings of japanese cities. Godzilla represented america ( a barbaric nuclear monster that destroyed japanese cities without morals or remorse ). It was created as anti-america and anti-occupation propaganda in post-war japan but has since been co-opted or "appriopriated" by hollywood and turned into a generic and farcical monster trope. We know what godzilla was about because the creators have told us so. Also, it's rather obvious given the context and the environment in which godzilla was created.
- whycome 2y agoIt was a thought and that’s why I said “one of the seeds”. I guess there’s such a thing as a “cultural zeitgeist” and when artists are creating stories and narratives they incorporate metaphors from things around them. They may not have explicitly read the newspaper article and said “giant lizards are a good bad guy” but that representation may have been culturally apt at the moment due to this story. The creature design had to elicit fear and the actual representation on film may have been influenced by it. The stance may be more t-Rex than crocodile and I’m really not sure “whale” factored into the final appearance on film. No one is questioning the impetus and relation to the fire bombings and nukes. > We know what godzilla was about because the creators have told us so. That’s the funny thing about culture and creation: a creator doesn’t always know their sources or have definite aspects to point to. Creation is a bit fuzzy. ;) (the same applies for LLMs!)
- euroderf 2y ago> Godzilla represented america ( a barbaric nuclear monster that destroyed japanese cities without morals or remorse ). As I've understood it (for decades), Godzilla represented nukes themselves.
- keepamovin 2y agoMy grandfather in his youth in Queensland worked for a while hunting crocodiles, to sell the pelts. A dog would be tied to a tree down by the river. The men would camp nearby. The dog would be heard barking, and men, armed with ropes, would pounce on the crocodile and circle its jaws with rope. Then tie it up and eventually shoot it so it could be skinned. The dog would most often survive. The crocs in those parts apparently loved dogs, and would come a way from the river to find them. The ropes on jaws worked, as Bite force strong down, not so much up. My grandfather would often remind me: you cannot outrun a croc on land. This story is from the 20s and 30s, last century. My grandfather’s beautiful old house in Queensland, which his family sold sans sentiment, had a full crocodile pelt rug on the floor, among many other marvels. I treasure many memories in my youth in that house of those marvels.
- klipt 2y ago> crocodile pelt rug That doesn't sound very comfortable to sit on or even step on, compared to a furry mammal pelt. Was it just decorative?
- keepamovin 2y agoIt was actually really comfortable. It's very smooth and shiny, and mostly flat. Shrug
- worthless-trash 2y agoCan confirm, nice to lay on when the temperature and humidity is high.
- stronglikedan 2y ago> you cannot outrun a croc on land SERPENTINE!!1!
- dhosek 2y agoI just had a flashback to the original The In-Laws film (for those who haven’t seen it, it’s a comedy masterpiece).
- Mainan_Tagonist 2y agoThis reminds me of a early chapter in Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson, where Shaftoe gets to meet Enoch (Red) Root.
- massinstall 2y agoYes! Makes me happy to see someone else notice this. :) I was thinking that this event might have been the inspiration for that part of the book?
- dwighttk 2y ago“A dubious distinction for a horrible event, no matter the real numbers” Not sure what’s dubious about it…
- happyopossum 2y ago> Not sure what’s dubious about it… A dubious distinction is one that is doubtful or possibly untrue. Given the lack of hard data, the aporcryphal nature of the stories, and the fog of war etc, dubious seems like a perfectly cromulent word to use here.
- quesera 2y agoThat's not correct. A "dubious distinction" is a distinction which is undesirable. West Virginia has the dubious distinction of being the US state with the lowest average educational achievement.
- 00N8 2y agoIMO both usages are correct, although yours is probably more common. 'Dubious' here means something like questionable/uncertain & it can apply either way: The distinction can be 'questionable' in terms of whether it's something to be proud of, or in terms of whether it's even true in the first place.
- quesera 2y agoThe phrase "dubious distinction" only means one thing though. If you parse the words separately, the other meaning is literally correct, but will not match the speaker's intent.
- FabHK 2y agoI had a similar discussion here with someone who thought that "dynamic programming" was the act of programming in some sort of dynamic manner. Not sure I managed to disabuse them of that notion.
- callumprentice 2y agoCrocodiles are scary. I remember reading a short story as a young man where a heart surgeon discovered crocs had over centuries, developed a chronic cardiac condition that left them comparatively sluggish and 'weak. He kept operating on them, fixing the problems until a few survived the surgery. As they recovered and grew bigger and stronger, they developed protuberances on their shoulders and a hard pointy plate at the end of their tail. You can see what's coming - they eventually turned into dragons.. They story was told in retrospective, from the safety of underground caves where what was left of humanity lived now.. Always crossed my mind when I see one :)
- wincy 2y agoI read that same story! The day of the dragon by Guy Endore https://www.scribd.com/document/437548811/Day-of-the-Dragon https://www.scribd.com/document/437548811/Day-of-the-Dragon
- callumprentice 2y agoOh wow - thank you. I can't wait to re-read it.
- curtisszmania 2y ago[dead]
- ChrisMarshallNY 2y agoI used to live in Uganda. We took a trip to (what, at the time was called) Murchison Falls. That's a big waterfall on the Nile River. We came at it from the north, so we were at the base of the falls. The pond at the bottom has sandbar islands all around, and they are covered with monster Nile crocs, which are damn near as big as salties. Scary beasts, and fast.
- ForOldHack 2y ago"The largest Nile crocodile ever recorded was 21 ft 2 in (6.45 m) long and weighed 2,300–2,400 lb (1,043–1,089 kg)." "Gustave is a legendary Nile crocodile from Burundi, reputed to be one of the largest and most fearsome of his kind to-date, He has been stated to have killed about over 300+ people for over a few decades, he is known for his strength, adaptation, and intelligence, he has never been captured for all this time, and he still resides in either the Ruzizi River and Lake Tanganyika, in Burundi, Africa. "
- reddit_clone 2y ago300+ probably _known_. Who knows what is the real count? I know I will never be killed by a crocodile bite. I will die of fright before it reaches me.
- ChrisMarshallNY 2y agoThey're pretty good at sneaking up on you. They generally kill you by pulling you under, and drowning you. Then, they let you rot, and gobble up the chunks, as they fall off. The really dangerous African river beasts, though, are hippos. Even the crocs leave them alone.
- dhosek 2y agoI just saw a video this morning of a baby hippo using an adult crocodile as a teething ring.
- tuumi 2y ago
- hnpolicestate 2y agoI've seen (unwisely) horrific videos of whole humans being digested inside dead crocodiles. The saltwater crocodile is a literal monster.
- asacrowflies 2y agoI'm unsure what this even means... The crocodile swallowed a camera and person whole?
- ArthurStacks 2y agoThe event was far worse than this article makes out. There were sharks aswell. That should give an idea of the environment those men were in. Waist deep in sea water, in a dense swamp, pitch black, being killed by sharks and crocs while dehydrating
- rex_lupi 2y agoFrom Wikipedia: > In his 2011 analysis of the Burma campaign, the historian Frank McLynn challenged this interpretation, saying, > Most of all, there is a single zoological problem. If 'thousands of crocodiles' were involved in the massacre, as in the urban (jungle) myth, how had these ravening monsters survived before and how were they to survive later? The ecosystem of a mangrove swamp, with an exiguous mammal life, simply would not have permitted the existence of so many saurians before the coming of the Japanese (animals are not exempt from the laws of overpopulation and starvation). > In 1974, a journalist, George Frazier, reported having asked the Japanese War Office about the crocodile attack and being told that they could not confirm that it had happened. In 2016, Sam Willis, a historian, reported that he had found documents indicating that the Japanese soldiers mostly drowned and/or were shot and that crocodiles scavenged on their corpses afterwards. > In 2000, a herpetologist, Steven Platt, visited Ramree Island, where he interviewed residents who had been alive during the war and who had been forced into slave labour by the Japanese; they "unanimously discounted any suggestion that large numbers of Japanese fell prey to crocodiles".
- ashoeafoot 2y agoOh thats easy, the population is constantly starving and maxing out, cannibalising on the young. Reptiles are great on surviving from very little. Once the abandunt food source enters that "starved" ecosystem , all those hungry husks get revived and inflated to full life.
- bigbacaloa 2y ago[dead]
- mediahitech801 2y ago[dead]
- jffhn 2y ago>dozens of crocodiles attacking the soldiers en masse, and appearing out of seemingly nowhere to drag off some poor soul. The nights were said to have been filled with dire screams, gunfire, and the sounds of animal attacks. Sounds like a metaphor for a team of unknowledgeable developpers stepping into the realm of concurrent code.
- BXLE_1-1-BitIs1 2y agoIn Australia, there have been cases where fishermen have disappeared from docks high up from water leaving behind their tackle. Don't dangle your legs over a dock. It is also unwise to sleep on a lonely beach. https://www.rarebookcellar.com/pages/books/67453/hugh-edwards/crocodile-attack-dramatic-true-stories-of-fatal-and-near-fatal-encounters-between-humans-and https://www.rarebookcellar.com/pages/books/67453/hugh-edward... Salties can snatch a bird in flight.