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A woman visiting a local beach was walking along the tide admiring shells when she picked up one that could have had deadly repercussions.
Sharing her story on TikTok, the woman shows herself finding a spotted, cone-shaped shell and picking it up. She was in Okinawa, Japan, when this happened.
“She doesn’t know it yet, but she’s about to pick up the world’s deadliest shell that leads to full paralysis in minutes,” the text on the video says.
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The woman picked up a cone snail shell with coils spotted in brown and white.
Cone snails are one of the most venomous animals on Earth, with approximately 600-700 species of slugs in existence, according to the Ocean Conservancy (OC).
Most venom in the snails will “cause tingling or numbness at the injection site, then spread to the impacted limb and eventually the entire body,” according to OC.
In a follow-up video that garnered millions of likes, the woman shared that she did research on the shell and its usual inhabitant, finding out even “worse” information about it.
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“My brain kept convincing me that I had been stung and just didn’t realize it. By the fourth day of panic, my husband was sick of reassuring me I was indeed going to live,” she said.
Cone snails are marine predators. They use venom to immobilize their prey by using their “harpoon-like teeth” to inject victims, according to the National Library of Medicine (NLM).
The video garnered nearly one million likes, with TikTokers weighing in on the incident.
“This is why life should have an instruction manual,” said one woman.
A user commented, “Don’t touch anything pretty.”
“I wonder if my mother-in-law would like a cone shell collection,” joked one TikToker.
Another user said, “I grew up in Hawaii and they taught me this in fourth grade.”
The person added, “But I don’t think it’s common knowledge.”
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