‘Alien hair ball’ sends Virginia woman to emergency room: It’s a venomous caterpillar

A Virginia woman says she went through “22 hours of hell” after brushing against a seemingly harmless ball of fuzz that turned out to be a highly venomous caterpillar.

Crys Spindel Gaston of New Kent says the split-second encounter on Sept. 4 sent her to the emergency room in excruciating pain.

The “alien hair ball” was later identified as a puss caterpillar, a benign-looking insect dubbed the nation’s “most dangerous” caterpillar, according to the National Center for Biotechnology Information.

“It was on my car... I didn’t see it and my leg barely brushed against it,” she posted on Facebook. “I could feel the pain moving up my leg and torso as the venom moved. It was wild.”

Gaston likened the feeling to “a scorching-hot knife,” and she suspected it had been caused by a jagged piece of metal on the car, according to VirginiaMercury.com. Then she looked down and saw a caterpillar: “It was no shape of any animal I had ever seen. It was a cross between like a mouse and a slug,” she told the news site.

Gaston has been documenting the ordeal in a series of funny Facebook posts that have compared her “tormentor” to the fictitious alien Tribbles featured in the 1960s TV series “Star Trek.”

“I swear, this year is something. We thought murder hornets were bad,” she posted. “I just want to spread the word. If I can save one person from this hell, I’d be happy.”

Gaston says she had never heard of the puss caterpillar before being stung, which is not surprising.

“Puss caterpillars are usually not abundant enough to be noticed,” the NC State Extension Service reports.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says even a slight “contact” with puss caterpillars results in a “severe sting for which the pain will be apparent immediately to the victim.”

However, their unkempt, hairy appearance is more goofy than threatening, with National Geographic referring to them as a ”toxic toupee” and a bad “comb-over.” (Wired.com made a similar analogy, with the headline: “Never Touch Anything that looks Like Donald Trump’s Hair.”)

“It is teardrop shaped and has long silky hair, making it resemble a tuft of cotton or fur,” reports the pharmaceutical site Merckmanuals.com. “When a puss moth caterpillar rubs or is pressed against a person’s skin, its venomous hairs are embedded, usually causing severe burning and a rash. ... Occasionally, the reaction is more severe, causing swelling, nausea, and difficulty breathing.”

The caterpillars are found primarily in southern states, from “Texas and north to Maryland and Missouri,” according to the University of Michigan. Some people can exhibit “symptoms of shock” after a sting, the university reports.

“Two Percocet is the only way I slept through it,” Gaston posted Saturday. “That and an ice pack strapped to my calf all night.”