Violet D`Mello tells of Port Elizabeth cheetah mauling
Baku, 5 May (AZERTAC). A British tourist who tried to protect a girl being mauled by captive cheetahs has told of how the animals then turned on her.
Violet D`Mello, 60, from Aberdeen, said she survived by “playing dead” at the Kragga Kamma Game Park in Port Elizabeth, South Africa last weekend.
She and another family had entered the enclosure for a photo next to the cats when the child was attacked.
Mrs D`Mello told the BBC she was now “on the mend”.
She said that the animals were not being “vicious” when they attacked her.
“It was, I think, a playful attack... I just remember something biting my head and dragging me down.
“But even then I was just thinking of the children [in the enclosure. We were told they would never attack adults, it was the children we were concerned about.”
Earlier, Mrs D`Mello told the Port Elizabeth Herald the incident was a “nightmare”.
She had intervened when one of the cheetahs grabbed the girl from the family.
“They weren`t being vicious,” she told the newspaper. “You could tell they were just excited, but it became serious very quickly”.
“It all happened so fast. After his sister was free, another boy tried to make a run for it.”
“As I stopped him, something jumped me from behind.”
A park guide pulled the cheetah off but another cat then attacked the 60-year-old.
Other people on the scene managed to get both cats off and everyone escaped the enclosure.
Mrs D`Mello suffered injuries to her head, stomach and legs during the incident, which happened during a holiday with her husband Archie.
She added: “Something inside me just said, ‘Don`t move. Don`t move at all. Don`t react, just play dead.”
“This was meant to be a holiday, but it`s really turned into a nightmare.”
Her husband Archie took photos of her ordeal and he told the BBC that the park`s guide seemed to be caught unawares by the attack.
“I was about five to 10 feet away. We didn`t expect anything to happen like this. I don't think even the guide knew what to do. She didn`t have any weapons, or stick or Taser, until somebody from the outside gave us a stick and the guide used it on the cheetah`s head to release the hold on my wife.”
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