A passerby who witnessed the ambush began throwing rocks at the hippo in an attempt to stop the attack. Eventually, the human offender scared the hippo and spat the boy out before retreating to the lake.
“It took the bravery of one Chrispas Bagonza, who was nearby, to save the victim after he stoned the hippo and startled it, causing it to drop the victim from its mouth,” Uganda Police wrote in a statement. release.
“This is the first incident of its kind where a hippo has emerged from Lake Edward and attacked a young child,” the police statement added.
Iga was taken to a nearby clinic for his injuries and later transferred to Bwera Hospital in western Uganda for further treatment. He was given a rabies shot and has since been released into the care of his parents, authorities said.
“Although the hippo was scared and returned to the lake, all residents near animal sanctuaries and habitats should be aware that wild animals are very dangerous,” the police statement read. “Wild animals instinctively see humans as a threat and any interaction can cause them to act strangely or aggressively.”
Hippos are the world’s third-largest land animal, living predominantly in rivers, lakes and swamps in eastern, central and southern sub-Saharan Africa, according to Virunga National Parklocated in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
In Africa, hippos kill about 500 people every year, according to National Geographic, and are considered one of the deadliest mammals in the world. They are twice as deadly as lions. The probability that a hippo attack will be fatal is between 29 and 87 percent, according to research published in 2020 by the Oxford Journal Medical Case Reports.
In 2017, a Detroit woman was killed while on an African safari with her family. Carol Sue Kirken, 75, was attacked by a hippo while she was on vacation in Tanzania, according to Detroit News. She quickly died in the arms of hers her son Robert hers, according to her. obituary.
Kristen Yaldor, a survivor of a hippo attack, said ABC News in 2019 that a hippo pulled her underwater while she was canoeing with her husband on the Zambezi River to celebrate her 37th birthday.
The hippo forcefully grabbed Yaldor’s leg and lashed it into the water for about 45 seconds. Yaldor said that he pulled on the hippopotamus’s mouth and it let go. His femur was broken and he underwent seven surgeries to repair his right leg when he returned to the United States.
“[I] I didn’t have a chance to scream, it was so fast,” Yaldor said.
