Restaurant owner’s ‘shock’ find in electrical box

STAFF at a Tablelands restaurant had a shock of a different kind when they found a 2.5m carpet snake hiding inside an electrical switchboard.

It started off as a normal morning at Nick's Swiss Italian Restaurant in Yungaburra, however one little noise bothered a worker.

Restaurant manager Nick Crameri was informed about the sound, and he said after some investigating, they isolated the sound to the switchboard.

"It's a big three-phase switchboard - there's about 60 fuses inside of it," Mr Crameri said.

He called an electrician, who was dispatched to the restaurant "in around 10 minutes".

"When they came and open everything, I had a shock my life," Mr Crameri said.

Inside the switchboard was the carpet snake, wedged inside live electrical cabling.

With mains power now cut from the store, pulling out the snake was should've been an easy task for Mr Crameri and his electrician.

However, just when they were about to rescue the snake, the restaurant's emergency generator kicked in - restoring power to the premises.

"We did switch off the generator but we can still hear sizzling," Mr Crameri said.

After further investigation, the restaurant's solar panel generator was also still active.

Finally, after the deactivation of the solar power, the snake was finally freed from the switchbox.

"The electrician said he's never seen anything like it in his life," Mr Crameri said.

Mr Crameri suspected the snake managed to get in to the switchboard through a small gap.

He said the electrician was able to seal the gap to prevent another stuck snake incident.

Fortunately for all parties involved, no-one was injured during the whole operation.

"I had a shock, the snake had a shock, no-one was electrocuted and no cables were damaged," Mr Crameri said.

"I've been here in Yungaburra for 30 years and this has never happened to me before.

"It was a very unusual experience."

The snake was moved to another location and let back in the wild.