Meth Gators

Submission 8,458

About

Meth Gators refers to the brief panic caused by a Facebook post by the Loretto, Tennessee Police Department which told followers to not flush drugs down the toilet lest the drugs go into the sewage and create hyperactive alligators high on methamphetamine. After becoming a national story, the department was forced to clarify that there are no such thing as meth gators and the post was a joke.

Origin

On July 13th, 2019, the Loretto Police Department posted to Facebook about a drug raid they had completed in which they discovered the perpetrator attempting to flush methamphetamine and drug paraphernalia down the toilet.^[1] In the post, they wrote (emphasis added):

"On a more or less serious note: Folks…please don’t flush your drugs m’kay. When you send something down the sewer pipe it ends up in our retention ponds for processing before it is sent down stream. Now our sewer guys take great pride in releasing water that is cleaner than what is in the creek, but they are not really prepared for meth. Ducks, Geese, and other fowl frequent our treatment ponds and we shudder to think what one all hyped up on meth would do. Furthermore, if it made it far enough we could create meth-gators in Shoal Creek and the Tennessee River down in North Alabama. They’ve had enough methed up animals the past few weeks without our help. So, if you need to dispose of your drugs just give us a call and we will make sure they are disposed of in the proper way.

The post gained over 700 likes and reactions as well as 830 shares.

Spread

After the police department's post, other outlets picked up the story as though the department was legimately warning against meth gators. Alabama outlet AL.com^[2] posted about the warning of "meth gators." USA Today also picked up the story.^[3] Twitter users also began joking about the idea of meth gators. Clothing brand Rotowear^[4] unveiled a tee shirt design for "Alabama Meth Gator" (shown below, left). Twitter user @jamesonroper^[5] joked that "Alabama Meth Gators" would make for a good college sports mascot (shown below, right).

On July 19th, the Loretto Police Department posted clarifying that meth gators are not real,^[6] writing "Let us be perfectly clear: the meth gator was a humorous illustration used to highlight the dangers of flushing drugs and other substances down your toilet. Alas, the meth-gator is not real. Let’s say that again: THE METH GATOR IS NOT (at this time) REAL. We’ve had to explain that to our cousins across the pond twice." They went on to say that they would take the opportunity afforded by the attention they received to create a website through which they'd sell merchandise based on some of their humorous posts, with the profits being donated to a local charity.

The update was covered by Twitter Moments^[7] and USA Today.^[8]