A devastated wife told how her husband died in agony from a snake bite in Africa before they were due to start a new life in Scotland. Sebastian Wicker, 40, who worked as a land manager in Mozambique, was attacked two weeks ago while out on safari.
Sebastian, wife Amanda, 30, and toddler son Oskar were set to settle in Amanda’s home town Fort William over the next few months.
The estate boss had been responsible for managing a 650,000-hectare area in Mozambique’s sprawling Zambezi Delta, which included buffalo, rhino, lions and leopards.
Yesterday, Amanda revealed how her husband had left a voice message after he’d been bitten, telling her how much he loved her before he died six hours later.
She said: “In the message after the snake bite you can hear that he is losing consciousness.
“I sent him a message back but he didn’t open it.
“One of his work colleagues phoned me in tears to tell me he had died. Then I just burst out crying. It is still such a shock. Sebastian had been attacked by buffalo in the past but a snake attack like this is almost unheard of. It is the first thing such a thing has has happened out here in 30 years.
“The odds of being attacked by a snake are so slim.”
Sebastian and his safari client were out spotting buffalo at a termite mound and the snake attacked him there. The reptiles usually live inside the holes in mounds.
Amanda said: “It was either a forest cobra or a black mamba, both carriers of venom which can affect the brain. The client had one dose of anti-venom with him which Sebastian was given. They took him to Marromeu Hospital – 45 minutes’ drive away – and there was no more anti-venom.
“Then he was taken by helicopter to Beira Private Hospital but by then it was too late.
“He had a very painful death and had to be given morphine. He was vomiting severely and struggling to breathe at the end. His tongue was swollen and it was a horrible way to die.
“I can’t imagine how he must have been suffering. It hurts to think about it even now.”
She has decided to carry on with their plans and return to Scotland for a better quality of life and plans to scatter his ashes near Glencoe.
The former teacher said: “He would be away for up to six months on safari with clients and was missing his son growing up.
“We had both decided to move to Scotland to start a new chapter and give our son a more normal life.
“It’s hard here for a wee one.
“Sebastian was going to find work here and had applied for his deer stalking licence. I was planning to set up my own domestic services company in Fort William. Sebastian was going to join us in December after I returned at the end of this month.
“We had so many plans and so much to look forward together.”
The couple met in South Africa in 2012, and she went to work with Sebastian and his family. They had Oskar in November 2020.
The Wicker family have been the subject of online abuse and death threats since Sebastian’s death became public because of his safari work, which includes the killing of local buffalo.
But Amanda said that all the income generated through the safari hunting trips is ploughed back into conservation and combating poaching.
She added: “Sebastian was a passionate conservationist and the culling of the buffalo was a necessary way of protecting the local environment in the same way as culling deer in Scotland.
“Unfortunately there are a lot of uneducated minds out there.
“Sebastian dedicated his life to conservation and that is ultimately what took him.”
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