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Texas Teen Playing ‘Pokémon GO’ Gets Bitten By Venomous Snake While Looking At Phone Screen

By Tara West
Published on: 07:06 PST, Jul 16, 2016

A Texas teen was bitten by a venomous snake while playing the popular new smartphone game Pokémon GO. The teen was reportedly walking to a Texas park in search of the fictional Pokémon characters when the teen inadvertently stepped on a snake. The teenager was unaware that the snake was in his path because he was too busy looking at his phone screen in a bid to find a rare Pokémon in the area.

The Daily Mail reports that a Texas teenager is lucky after a potentially life-threatening run-in with a poisonous snake while Pokémon hunting. The teen, 18-year-old Lane Smith, was playing Pokemon GO when they noticed a Pokestop at a nearby park. The teens decided to walk to the park, Parker Square, to catch some of the Pokémon in the area. However, while walking towards the park, two of Lane’s friends noticed a snake, believed to be a Copperhead, on the path. Before they could warn Lane of the snake, the teen had stepped directly on the snake while wearing flip flops.

The snake reportedly struck the teen on the right big toe but only landed one fang. Fortunately, this meant that the teen would not need anti-venom and that he would come out of the ordeal relatively unscathed, minus some swelling on his foot and redness around the bite area. After stepping on the snake, the teen called his mother and she told him to immediately come home. After getting back to his house, the mother took Lane to the hospital where they determined the snake was poisonous but that only one fang had penetrated his skin meaning that he should heal on his own.

The Pokémon GO snake bite accident happened on Tuesday night, and the teen was released from the hospital on Wednesday. Lane admits that he didn’t see the snake because he was hunting for Pokémon and only looking at his phone screen. However, he says he did see something in his peripheral vision just before the snake bite but thought it was a stick.

This isn’t the first injury to result from Pokémon GO trainers not paying attention to their surroundings. According to CNN, two men in California fell off of a large cliff in Encinitas while playing the game. According to the reports, the two men, both in their early 20s, climbed over a fence near the cliff edge to catch a Pokémon on the other side.

The fence had signs posted that said “Do not cross” and “No trespassing” but that didn’t stop the two men from scaling the fence in a bid to “catch ’em all.” However, the warnings were in place for good reason. The edges around the cliff are not stable and the men quickly realized that the fence was in place for their own safety. The weak edges collapsed sending the men falling off the edge of the cliff.

The men fell 50 to 90 feet from the cliff edge and firefighters were called to rescue the pair. Both men were taken to the hospital and are expected to make a full recovery.

Though the Pokémon GO app warns players to remain aware of their surroundings, but it seems that some players are not heeding the warning and the results can lead to hospital visits. Fortunately, the Pokémon snake bite victim and the two men that fell off of the cliff are expected to fully recover.

[Image via Katja El Sol/Shutterstock]

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