Largest alligator of the World

A family in Alabama are celebrating after catching the largest alligator ever recorded in the state over the weekend. The mammoth beast which measured 15-feet long and weighed 1011.5 pounds was captured by five members of the Stokes family near Thomaston. It took the family, consisting of Mandy Stokes husband John Stokes brother-in-law Kevin Jenkins and his children Savannah 16 and Parker 14 ten hours to capture the monster. The hunt started on Friday night and lasted well into Saturday morning. Mandy Stokes said her crew went through the full range of emotions as they first staked the animal before battling it then killing it and finally struggling to take it back to shore. He came up just as calm as he could Mandy Stokes told AL.com. When I pulled the trigger this time water just exploded on all of us. When they finally got the beast back to dry land he was so big that he crushed the winch system normally used by Alabama Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries biologists. Alligators are the only dangerous-game species that can legally be hunted in the state. In the end a backhoe had to be brought in to lift the animal and officially weigh it. The mammoth gator has now been officially named as the largest ever legally harvested in Alabama and it could even be a new world record. In June Safari Club International declared a 14-foot 8-inch 880-pound alligator killed in Chalk Creek near Lufkin Texas by Justin Wells of Bossier City La. in 2007 as the new world record. It isnt clear which metric - length weight or a combination of both - SCI used to come to its decision. The Stokes gator measured 70.5 inches around the stomach 46 inches around the base of the tail and had a 16-inch snout measurement.