A man who fled his Texas home as Hurricane Harvey flooded his neighborhood returned home to find an alligator in his dining room.

Brian Foster arrived at his Humble, Texas, home on Friday to survey the damage caused by the record-breaking rain brought on by the storm but as he looked around his home with a rescue crew, he saw the 9ft alligator crawling along the floor.

He called the police immediately and when officers arrived, they taped the alligator’s mouth shut so it could be taken away. It required four officers to carry the alligator through the house, out the front door and into waiting vehicles. Wildlife officials now plan to move the beast back into its natural habitat.

Earlier this week, a woman took a video of two huge alligators floating in her backyard in Missouri City, Texas. And on Tuesday, an alligator sanctuary warned that up to 350 alligators could soon be on the loose in southeast Texas due to rising floodwaters.

The sanctuary said they had captured all the crocodiles, the snakes, and the two most fearsome alligators and placed them in a trailer to prevent them from escaping, but warned there is little they can do to stop the escape of the rest of the alligators from their outdoor enclosures.