Man attacked by alligator

Will Georgitis is lucky to have his life — and his arm — after a way-too-close encounter with an alligator at the bottom of a Charleston riverbed. 

The alligator got a hold of Georgitis as he came up from the water of Cooper River after an April 15 dive. Georgitis frequents Charleston waters, looking for shark teeth and other fossils. 

Georgitis told The Journal that as soon as he surfaced from his dive, he and the alligator spotted each other and it “bolted” toward him. 

“When he was about three feet away from me, he turned his head and opened his jaws up,” Georgitis said. 

Georgitis said he attempted to jab the gator with his screwdriver but he’s not sure whether or not he missed — either way, the alligator “perfectly clamped” down on Georgitis’ arm. He described the feeling as an “instant vice.”

Georgitis bearhugged the alligator in an attempt for the alligator not to spin his arm off. 

He then attempted to “jam” the screwdriver into the alligator’s eye, but said that only made the alligator more agitated.

“He was, I guess, fed up with trying to fight me on the surface, ‘If this thing’s gonna fight back this hard, I’ll just take him to the bottom,’” Georgitis said.

With his air tank running empty, Georgitis was driven headfirst to the bottom of the riverbed, where the alligator pressed its snout against him and laid on top of him. 

“The whole time, I’m just counting every breath like I could feel my life just ticking away,” Georgitis said. “Every breath is just taking me closer to an empty tank.”

Georgitis was able to retrieve his screwdriver once more, this time feeling around the alligator’s teeth looking for the biggest tooth he could find and shoving the screwdriver into the alligator’s gums. Georgitis was successful, because this agitated the alligator once more — but it also moved his arm closer to the front of the alligator’s mouth. 

Still, he wasn’t free. Even worse, seconds later Georgitis took his last breath from the air tank. 

“I don’t need my arm, I just want to live,” Georgitis said as he was faced with a tough choice to make.

Georgitis said he put his feet under the neck of the alligator and “launched” himself backward as hard as he could. 

Georgitis was finally free and was successful in his attempt to swim back up 50 feet to the boat — and still had his arm. 

His right arm suffered a broken radius and a dislocated ulna with both bones “basically shoved up” into his bicep, he said. He also had two “gigantic” slashes, one on his wrist and one above his elbow, both of which ripped through tendons, blood vessels and nerves. 

Surgeons have since “extensively repaired” his arm with a plate and seven screws, he added.

‘Mom’s gonna be so sad’

Georgitis graduated from Walhalla High School in 2002 and moved down to Charleston in 2012, but his mother, Jane Reed, still lives in the area. 

Reed told The Journal she got the phone call that her son had been attacked by an alligator that Monday night. 

“We weren’t sure whether he was going to be alive or dead,” Reed said.

Tearing up, she shared what Will had told her one of the times she visited him in a Charleston hospital. 

“He said he was going down with the alligator and his one thought that ran through his mind was, ‘Mom’s gonna be so sad,’” she said. 

Reed taught math at Walhalla High School and only had good things to say about her son’s high school journey. She said her son was a “good student,” had been made prom king, was in the marching band and was on the debate team. 

Growing up, Georgitis had always been into collecting anything he could get his hands on. 

“He had a bug collection that was all over his wall, he collected rocks,” Reed said. “I collect shells and I think he kinda took up on that. He’s always been that nature kind of guy.” 

And he’s still busy with collecting. 

Because of all his shark teeth and other river artifacts taking up the shelves and walls of his place, “his apartment in Charleston is called ‘the museum’ by all his friends,” Reed said. 

All in all, his mother said she was “proud of him” for his “presence of mind and courage.”

“So thankful he is alive,” Reed said.

‘I can’t imagine what the bills are going to be’ 

Donations to Georgitis have come flowing in through both GoFundMe and Venmo. He doesn’t have health insurance, so he said those donations “mean the world to him.”

“I really do want to thank everybody that’s donated, profusely want to thank them,” he said, adding he won’t know the final tally of his medical bills until he’s all fixed up. “I can’t imagine what the bills are going to be.” 

For those interested in donating to Georgitis for his medical bills, his GoFundMe page can be found at https://gofund.me/f391583c. His Venmo is William-Georgitis-1.