A panicked 45-year-old Ohio woman called 911 on Thursday afternoon with ample reason: A 5.1/2-foot long boa constrictor she had rescued a day earlier had wrapped itself around her neck, was biting her face and wouldn’t let go.

‘Please hurry,’ the frightened woman told a dispatcher. ‘He’s biting my nose.’

The dispatcher sent firefighters and police to the woman’s home in Sheffield Lake, a community about 25 miles (40 kilometres) west of Cleveland in Lorain County, but seemed stumped, reports the Associated Press.

‘I’ve never heard of this before,’ the dispatcher is heard saying in a recording of the woman’s call.

Rescuers arrived within minutes and found the woman lying in the bloodied driveway of her home, the snake holding tight just as she described. A firefighter cut off the snake’s head with a pocket knife and the 45-year-old woman, who hasn’t been identified, was taken by ambulance to a hospital for treatment.

The woman told the dispatcher during the call she had rescued two boa constrictors on Wednesday and that she owned nine ball pythons.