By DPA
Hong Kong : A British woman in Hong Kong described Sunday how she fought with a 4.5-metre Burmese python to save her pet dog from being crushed to death.
Catherine Leonard, 41, kicked and punched the snake after seeing it wrap itself around her 20-kg pet dog Poppy near a stream on a walking trail in Hong Kong’s rural Sai Kung Country Park.
Leonard was walking her pet and two other dogs on a trail close to a family picnic area a week ago when the python pounced on Poppy and coiled itself around the dog.
After hearing what she described as “a yelp that was like a scream”, Leonard dashed to free the four-year-old dog, kicking and grappling with the snake.
“I’m not sure exactly what I did but I kicked it and I tried to pull Poppy free. The snake was twisted around her, that was the problem,” she said.
“Somehow Poppy managed to get away and the python slithered away. It was all over in about a minute.
“I was very shaken afterwards and really scared. If I’d had the chance to think about it, I wouldn’t have done what I did.”
The attack took place close to the spot in the rural New Territories, 30 km north of Hong Kong island, where a 22-kg husky was crushed to death despite its owner’s attempts to save it in July last year.
Despite its reputation as a high-rise city, Hong Kong has large rural areas north of Kowloon with country parks that are home to monkeys, wild boar, small deer and snakes.
Burmese pythons can grow to around six metres long and to a weight of 90 kg and will often ambush prey by lying in wait at water holes or by hanging from trees.