By primetime on Sunday, more than 4.1 million hungry Americans drooled, jaws prepared to slacken, as Rosolie entered a muddy snakepit. Without the promise of human consumption, what followed would have been startling enough. “At first she wasn’t interested in eating me,” he recalls, months after the show was filmed (Discovery UK will screen it on Friday night). “Then she hit me hard, and wrapped me up. It was amazing to feel the power of that animal. Eventually she started to focus on my shoulders and head.”

The biggest anacondas have heads the size of large dogs, are longer than buses and weigh as much as two average men. They eat lots and not often, spending time suffocating prey and crunching bones before dislocating their jaws to swallow mangled carcasses whole. “Once they crush your shoulders you’ll go down the throat very easily,” Rosolie says. “I know a chef whose father was eaten by an anaconda. It happens.”