A Pennsylvania man died after experiencing an extremely rare snake bite during a camping trip in Elk County last weekend .

Russell E. Davis, 39 of Freedom, Penn., died early Sunday morning after being bitten by a venomous snake at his family camp in Medix Run, about 125 miles northeast of Pittsburgh, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported.

Davis was building a fire at a rural camp when he was bitten by a rattlesnake. After being bit, "he went running into the camp and told his girlfriend to take him to a hospital," Armstrong County Coroner Brian K. Myers told the newspaper.

While they were on their way to a hospital, Davis "began to have severe breathing problems," so his girlfriend stopped at a local bar for help, Myers told the newspaper. Once an ambulance arrived about 30 minutes later, Davis was transported to Penn Highlands Health Care in St. Marys, but he was already in "acute respiratory distress."

Medical workers at Penn Highlands said that Davis was given an anti-venom treatment, before he was put in a medical helicopter to be flown to a Pittsburgh hospital. That's when he went into full cardiac arrest, forcing the helicopter to land at a hospital in Kittanning mid-flight. He was pronounced dead there just before 5:30 a.m. Sunday, a coroner told the Post-Gazette.

"People react differently to snake venom. I don't know where on his body the bite was, or what other health conditions he might have had," said Ray Bamrick, a reptile keeper for the Pittsburgh Zoo and PPG Aquarium, to KDKA-TV.

Davis' death marks the first time someone in the state has died from such a snake bite in the last 25 years, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, reports The New York Daily News.

Only about five people die each year from venomous snakes across the country.