Have you seen an alligator in the Great Miami River in Piqua

A woman said she and her friends spotted an alligator Monday afternoon from the Shawnee Bridge that was swimming in the Great Miami River.

“We saw something moving in the water and at first I thought it was a log, but it was moving too fast,” she told a Piqua police dispatcher. “One of my friends saw it, too, and threw a rock at it and it dove under the water so we followed it for a little bit and he shined a flashlight on it, and it was a gator, an alligator.”

She said the alligator was about 5 to 6 feet long.

The dispatcher called the woman after her mother, who was not in Piqua, called emergency operators around 3:30 p.m. to report the alligator sighting, saying she was concerned for people’s safety. She provided her adult daughter’s phone number.

>> 7½ foot crocodile found swimming with children in West Alexandria creek

During her call, the mother also mentioned a previous news story about a crocodile captured in Bantas Fork Creek in Preble County on property of a church she formerly attended. The reptile was spotted when a group of children was in the water.

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Jen Balduf