One woman thought that her Sturgis Motorcycle Rally at Custer State Park in South Dakota would be remarkable, but it turned out it became a nightmare.
A 54-year-old woman from Iowa was trying to take photos of a herd at Custer State Park in South Dakota. She saw a small wild bison calf that was part of the herd of a beautiful bison group. She thought that taking a picture with it would even make her experience unforgettable so she went even closer to one small bison but what she didn’t expect was that an adult bison, probably the calf’s mother, rushed out of the herd and came charging toward the risk-taking woman.
The incident was captured by one of the bystanders. The video shows how the bison struck the woman and knocked her to the ground in front of all the other bikers. They watched in awe as she was thrown into the air. The bison attack was so fearsome that the woman was literally knocked out of her pair of jeans. She got her pants knocked off because the bison was intent on teaching her a lesson for getting so close to the baby.
Watch it here: Inside Edition/Youtube
The person who recorded the encounter wants it to serve as a reminder about what can happen when getting too close to a wild animal.
Custer State Park officials in a statement Friday said the incident is a warning about the dangers of approaching the animals. They also said that the woman was flown to a local hospital and confirmed in a separate Facebook post that she escaped serious injury.
“This was certainly an unfortunate occurrence. We cannot caution visitors enough to respect the space of these animals and all the animals they encounter in the park,” the statement said.
Park visitor Jo Reed, who filmed the video, said the incident happened Wednesday.
“The bison were everywhere we went, herds and herds of them,” she wrote in a Facebook post. “We came around a curve just behind a group of motorcyclists and there was a herd standing in the middle of the road, most noticeably a cow (female) and her calf which was nursing.”
Below are the comments from people online after watching the video:
“Glad the bison is safe,” wrote one concerned viewer.
Most people agreed that what the woman did was not wise.
“Nah, that isn’t bravery. That’s stupidity,” one person wrote about the woman who approached the wild animals.
“Accident? I didn’t see any accident. I just saw a bison doing what bison do. Nothing accidental about it at all.”
“Wrong: fear is for those with brains. This woman clearly has no brains or pants.”
“The news reporter says it’s ’a bison accident.’ I’d just call it plain damn stupidity.”
Sources: AWM, News Center, Independent, Yahoo News, Today, NBC News
