One reason not to visit Australia? A spider big enough to carry a mouse up a fridge

Jason Womal’s neighbor in Queensland, Australia, caught him before he left for work early Sunday morning.

“You want to see something cool?” the neighbor asked.

“Hell, yeah,” Womal said.

So the two went to the neighbor’s place, and what Womal witnessed is the stuff of nightmares — something so horrendous that it’s been watched nearly 13 million times since he posted it on his Facebook page.

That’s a huntsman spider — also known as a giant crab spider — carrying that mouse.

Graham Millage, the manager of the Australian Museum’s arachnology collection, told The Guardian that it was unusual, though not unheard of, for spiders to target vertebrates.

He said the banded huntsman spider’s leg span can get as long as 6 inches.

“This is the first time I’ve seen one catch a mouse, but I have seen huntsmen catch geckos,” Millage said. “I’ve seen a redback spider catch a snake in its web, I’ve seen a golden orb spiders catch birds.”

One of Millage’s colleagues, arachnid expert Helen Smith, doubted whether the spider killed the mouse itself, partly because the mouse’s stiff tail suggests it had been dead for a while.

Regardless, that’s quite a feat of strength, she marveled.

After nearly 70,000 people commented on the video — “Nope nope nope. Burn the house down,” wrote one woman — Womal posted an update about the spider’s status.

The spider is fine.

He’s been named Hermie.

And now he’s paying rent.

This story was originally published October 24, 2016 at 6:09 PM with the headline "One reason not to visit Australia? A spider big enough to carry a mouse up a fridge."