Story By: Anna Guran, Sub Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Central European News

Video Credit: CEN/@Russia24

This is the moment a cat battles to the death with a snake which escaped from a petting zoo before the moggy manages to kill the lunging reptile and drags it away in its mouth.

The bizarre incident occurred after a snake escaped from a petting zoo in the SEC Watercolour shopping centre in the city of Volgograd in the Volgograd Oblast of western Russia.

Local media report employees from the petting zoo searched through the entire shopping centre for the snake, with one employee telling reporters: “The territory of the shopping centre is huge, the snake could be anywhere.”

The management of the shopping centre assured shop owners and customers that the 50-centimetre snake was not dangerous but they could not find it.

However, later that evening a customer recorded a video of the snake fighting with a stray cat in the car park and shared the clip with local media.

In the video, the ginger cat can be seen staring at the coiled-up snake. The moggy takes cautious steps around the reptile but when the snake strikes at the moggy it fights back, scratching at the snake.

The snake then goes still before it strikes at the cat again but the moggy appears to bite the reptile as it avoids its attack.

The cat then goes in for the kill, sinking its teeth into the snake before bragging its body across the car park in its mouth.

The species of snake is unclear.

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