MISSOURI CITY, Texas – A Missouri City father and restaurant owner was stunned to see what his daughter saw right outside their front door. It was an alligator.
Knowing that the wild animal was keeping his children from school and keeping him from work at the restaurant, he took matters into his own hands when help was not available.
Mike Trinh is a dedicated dad and a dedicated restaurant owner of Mike’s Seafood.
However, before work Tuesday, he had a morning that was anything but typical.
“I woke up this morning groggy. I’m ready to just take my kids to school. It’s my daughter’s first day in middle school,” Trinh said. “So she runs back [and says], ‘Dad! There’s an alligator in the front door!’ I’m thinking she’s joking... not wanting to go to school. I say, ‘Just stop! We’re going to school today. Just stop.”
Little did he know, she was right.
“Walked out front. {And said] ‘Holy...yeah, that’s a gator!’” Trinh said pointing outside his door on his driveway. “It was right here...right here!”
Trinh’s first thought after the shock was, “We got to go to school. First thing’s first!”
His inspiration and unofficial education?
“Steve Irwin,” Trinh said, smiling.
Watching hours and hours of the iconic wildlife expert, nicknamed “The Crocodile Hunter,” Trinh said he remembered what Irwin did on the shows.
“You just know you got to put the towel over [the alligator’s] head,” Trinh said. “That’ll calm it down.”
Trinh tried calling multiple authorities for help, but the facilities were not open, and he said it was not efficient.
Without any direct expertise or official instruction, Trinh took the risk and tried to take matters into his own hands.
“’Put the camera on because I don’t think no one is going to believe me if I told them!’” he told his 19-year-old daughter.
Trinh used towels to try and cover the alligator’s eyes.
“First one: missed! Second one: kind of a miss! And you could see [the alligator was angry]—Its mouth was open,” Trinh said.
Eventually, he was successful.
With a towel, eventually, over the alligator’s head, he continued on.
“I took my kids to school,” Trinh said. “When I came back—it was still there.”
His 19-year-old daughter, who also helped to drive her younger siblings to school, helped her dad.
" I said, ‘Hey, honey get the tape, and tape it up,’” Trinh said. “I was holding his mouth securely so it wouldn’t bite my daughter.”
Duct and Jiu Jitsu tape secured the alligator’s mouth.
Trinh and his friend then loaded the alligator up on the back of his truck, removed the tape, and released it to a nearby pond from where they believed the alligator came.
“Once we removed the tape. It didn’t do anything. It hissed...I crossed it off the list. I’m going to wrestle an alligator today,” Trinh said.
It is a story he’s glad he got on video.
“I think if [my daughter] told her friends at school, they probably wouldn’t believe her,” he added.
Trinh said he is thankful for all the years he watched Steve Irwin.