Snake in the oven: North Carolina family baking frozen pizza finds cooked reptile
A snake ruined a North Carolina family’s plans to have an “easy dinner” Monday night.
Amber Helm said she and her husband Robert had preheated the oven in their Wake Forest home and popped in a frozen pizza.
After about 10 minutes, Helm said the oven started smoking and smelling terrible.
So they opened it up and saw a dead snake inside, Amber Helm said.
“I opened up the oven and thought ‘is that part of the oven?’ I looked more closely and it was a snake,” she said.
She said the family didn’t eat the pizza and she took her two sons, ages 3 and 1, out to dinner while her husband dealt with the snake.
“I put the oven on self clean after I pulled that crispy critter out,” Robert Helm said.
The snake was about 18 inches long, Robert Helm said, and about the diameter of a quarter.
The couple is unsure how long the snake had been in the oven, but Amber Helm said she had last used the oven to make a ham on Christmas and it was snake-free.
She said they think the snake was alive initially and was burned to death because his mouth was “wide open” like he was trying to get out or bite something.
“I’m not happy about the way that the snake died,” Amber Helm said. “That’s a sad way to go for any living thing.”
The couple isn’t sure what type of snake it was and didn’t call anyone about it since it was already dead.
But Amber Helm said they are trying to figure out how the snake got in and who to call to make sure there are no other snakes .
“I have two little boys so I’m just so concerned,” she said. “Every time I see a shadow I’m like freaking out.”
This story was originally published January 1, 2020 at 2:42 PM.
