An otter attacked a boy and his grandmother in a popular park Thursday, leading park officialsto warn others to stay away.
Two members of the Moser family left their favorite fishing spot on the Pilchuck River with wounds all over their heads and bodies.
"It was facing us and it came right up over his head,” Tabitha Moser said. She watched as her 8-year-old son Bryce was brutally attacked by an animal they couldn't even identify at first. She said Bryce was standing in the water that runs along Lake Connor Park when the animal wrapped its body around the little boy's.
"My mom is there like lightning-- she ripped it off. She kind of ripped it off and it immediately attached on to her,” Moser said.
They later learned it was an otter that nearly ripped her mother's eye out; she needed surgeries and more than 100 stitches.
"Her whole eye was kind of taken apart,” says Moser of her mother’s injuries.
Friday, the Department of Fish and Wildlife closed the beach and officers went searching for the otter.
"Most likely the animal will be euthanized,” Sgt. Jennifer Maurstad said. But only if it’s found.
While a neighbor said us she's surprised to hear about the attack, she said it has happened before, relatively recently.
"On July 12th or 13th there were some people up river and there were some guys who came up and walked back and said there had been an otter attack up there,” said Sharon McDowell, who lives along the river.
Lake Connor Park security officials said they heard about a third incident. None was as brutal as the one that happened to the Mosers, though. Tabitha said if it wasn’t for her mother, her son may not have survived.
“If she did not get in there like she did, if he took on the wounds that she did, I don't know if he would have made it without drowning because it was taking him under water," she said.
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