Aurora Starchild
A wild and terrifying moment was captured on video when a coyote roamed into a California suburb and almost stole a small child. A 2-year-old toddler gets taken out of her car seat and a coyote sneaks around the vehicle and grabs her. Luckily, the father saw the coyote before it got too far and saved his little girl.
Videos by Rare
Coyote Sneaks Around Car, Drags Girl Facedown
The incident occurred in Woodland Hills, a suburb in the greater Los Angeles area. The dad, Ariel Eliyahuo, can be seen via the family’s Ring doorbell camera footage. He puts his toddler on the lawn and turns back into his car to grab some toys. Meanwhile, a coyote sneaks around the backside of the car, out of Ariel’s view.
As the toddler, wearing a pink jacket, is walking towards the house, the coyote leaps forward and grabs her with its jaws. The girl immediately slams forward onto her face as the coyote starts dragger her away, facedown on the sidewalk. Ariel looks up and walks around in the nick of time. He charges at the coyote, who releases his daughter. The father then picks up his girl and chucks a bottle at the coyote, who has stopped only about ten feet away.
The video then shows the dad carrying his daughter toward the house as she is visibly distraught.
Coyote Attack Leaves Locals Anxious, Afraid for Their Kids’ Safety
Speaking to KTLA, the girl’s mom, Shira Eliyahuo, said that they never expected this kind of thing to happen in their neighborhood.
“They’re always playing outside,” Shira said of her children. “Now I’m afraid for them to even go in the backyard by themselves… I never thought this would happen. There’s always a lot of coyotes here but I never thought one would just attack.”
Although the girl was at home, she had to be taken to the Emergency Room for serious injuries.
“She has a lot of scratches on her left leg,” said Shira. The coyote had managed to break the toddler’s skin. “And one of them is really deep, actually. So, we had to go to the ER. We had to get her rabies shots…. He just kind of dragged her, so her face is also a little bit bruised.”
Disturbingly, while KTLA was interviewing the Eliyahua family, a coyote appeared in the background. Ariel could be seen chasing it away with a 2×4.
If the Coyote Is Identified It Will Be Euthanized
Patrick Foy, a California Department of Fish and Wildlife information captain, told the LA Times that the coyotes have been a growing concern for some time.
“This coyote has been a major problem on this street for weeks,” Foy said. “We had already been talking about this as there were previous reports about the coyote potentially threatening pets.”
Foy added that the toddler’s clothes are being tested for DNA to see if it can be matched to any of the local coyotes. He said that, if matched, the coyote will be euthanized.
Coyotes are cute but, as the video shows, can be extremely dangerous. Coyotes are known to attack small animals but they are capable of grabbing small children, too. They also co-exist with their packs. Hence, if an animal (or small child) is dragged out of sight, it can be attacked by more than one coyote.
