Cape Town - A young nurse was in surgery on Monday night while her father and brother lay dead after being attacked by wildebeest.
Julie Moore, 22, a nurse at Dihlabeng regional hospital in Bethlehem, Free State, had been visiting her parents in the Maclear district in the Eastern Cape.
On Saturday morning she, her parents Mike and Adele, and her brother John-John had taken a family walk from their farm to the village of Rhodes, when they encountered a black wildebeest in an encampment on a neighbouring farm, which they had not known held the wild animals.
It is not clear which family member the wildebeest charged first, but one report suggested it was the young woman and that her father and brother had tried to wrestle the animal away from her.
The mother, Adele, had managed to flee unharmed, and began calling for help on her cellphone, and also at a neighbouring farm.
Julie had managed to get away too, but not far before she collapsed with serious injuries to her head and face.
She was then attacked by a second wildebeest, but was rescued in the nick of time by armed farmers who had raced to their assistance after her mother’s SOS.
But her father and brother had been killed and lay dead, apparently trampled to death.
Julie was being operated on at the Bloemfontein Mediclinic on Monday night, reports said.
Cape Argus