Speaker 1: Welcome to episode ninety two of Get Out Alive, a
podcast about animal attacks, why they happen, and how we
can avoid them. I'm your host, Ashley, and I'm Nick,
and I swear eventually I'm going to stop apologizing for
not uploading episodes more often. But at this point, like
with school and everything, I'm kind of just doing the
research when I have time and when i'm interested. Today
so today, yeah, because I don't know, we started this
for fun. I want to keep it fun. I don't
want it ever to be a chore, which I know
I've said before. So that's it, moving right along. Thank
you to all of you who subscribe to you get
notifications when these are put out. And thanks for those
of you who leave five star reviews wherever you're listening.
Speaker 2: Bump those numbers up. Let's go.
Speaker 1: Okay, So today's reviews coming from Apple Podcasts left by
Maura Max, and it says I found this podcast a
few months ago and absolutely love listening to this at work.
I'm a plant biology research assistant, so.
Speaker 2: Cool, that's me. I'm planted. Oh yeah, you are a.
Speaker 1: Plant Nick, and getting a mix of information with humor
is the perfect combination to make the hours fly by
love how Ashley is able to have great chemistry with everyone,
but of course her and Nick are unmatched.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. Facts.
Speaker 1: My goal is to visit more national parks in my lifetime,
so I will definitely keep all the info I learned
here in mine. Thanks. I feel like, if anything, Maura,
we could learn from you about plants, because I know
nothing about plants. So the topic for this episode was
inspired by one of my previous co workers named Nick,
who is a marine. Also a marine. Yes, you were
both Nick's named Nope, you're both marines named Nick. No,
how I did that? Yeah, I can't remember how this
came up, like how he suggested it. But long story short,
we're doing today's episode on cows.
Speaker 2: Bobby has heard of some fucked up shit with cows.
Speaker 1: I think he was referencing a previous episode. He's doing
this thing where he's listening to all of them and
then just like randomly texting me about from episodes that
we did like two years ago, and I'm like, I
have no idea what you're talking.
Speaker 2: I don't remember a single thing about that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, recently he was like, oh, I love your Roman
Empire bit. I was like couldn't tell you what that was.
It was great, Yeah, for sure, everything so much.
Speaker 3: Well I sure, okay, Nick, before we get into anything,
you have a cow story that you've told on this
podcast before.
Speaker 1: Do you want to tell it again?
Speaker 2: I mean like, sure, yeah, I d ask I was
on a field trip to a local high school's like
agricultural program area thing held. Were you kindergarten so I
was have her older kinggartners five six something like that?
Sure yeah sure. So Like we're walking around and like
there are some guys like, oh, we're gonna bring a
cow out, so all the kids see a cow, Like
all right, sweet. So I'm being me, bumbling around, looking,
you know, at the trees and shit, and like someone
starts yelling us something. I turned around. There's a dude
like running out with a cow. The cow is like
dragging him, and I'm like, oh great, it's coming right
at me. This is gonna be fun. So like one
of the teachers like grabs me and like throws them
out to the side and she gets fucking ran over
by this cow and like breaks her ankle. On this
field trip, it was awesome. And me just being me,
I'm just bumbling around like, oh God, my grandmother's sauce
is over It's literally like across the street from my
grandmother's house. I'm like, oh, my grandma sauce is over there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this one's being trampled and you're like waving like Grandma.
Speaker 2: I remember all this happening. I remember zero like concern,
like oh no, I almost died now.
Speaker 1: It was just like oh all right, yeah, of course
not you're like a baby.
Speaker 2: Fall yeah, like yeah that survival and sticks aren't really there,
you know, yeah, which is ironic. I've done a lot
of a shit, but yeah, cows are big and scary
and fast and god damn they can fuck you up,
like without even trying.
Speaker 1: You know, if this episode has taught me, like researching
this episode has taught me anything, we I feel like
you need to go down a rabbit hole or like
a series on domestic animals or like farm animals because
they like obviously it's because we interact with them more
hands on and there's a lot of them, which is
why there's more instances of this happening. But still, like
they hurt a lot of people.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, oh definitely, I mean that not just cows,
like farm animals in general. Yeah, that's mean terrifying. Horses
are terrifying. I'm not a horse guy, like I have
never ridden one, Like I'm good, I don't it's never
ridden a horse. Nope, don't need to.
Speaker 1: Okay, I love riding horses. I have a very healthy
fear of horses.
Speaker 2: As you should. Yeah.
Speaker 1: They we should be more afraid of their teeth, you
know what I mean?
Speaker 2: Yeah, everything, all of it. We literally used them as
war animals, like there's a reason, all.
Speaker 1: Right, speaking of let's break down some of these statistics
regarding how often cows.
Speaker 2: Kill people or hurt people kill Okay, we're talking injuries
or deaths, yes, okay, Well what's included in these statistics?
Which one well I'm literally about to tell you, okay, God,
damn So on average.
Speaker 1: Nick, cows killed twenty two people a year in the
United States, Damn Yeah. According to data from the years
two thousand and three to two thousand and seven by
the CDC, ten of the twenty one fatalities involved attacks
by individual bulls, six involved attacks by individual cows so females.
Five involved multiple cattle, So that'd be like a stampede probably,
like I heard, yeah, yeah, So the CDC stated, quote,
these deaths occurred throughout the year in descedence, which means
people who died tended to be older, aged over sixty years,
and that was like sixty seven percent of the deaths
and ninety five percent of the people who died were men.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that makes sense, I mean all the cattle workers
in there.
Speaker 1: Then, except in one case the cause of death was
blunt force trauma to the head or chest. Circumstances associated
with these deaths include working with cattle and enclosed areas.
Of thirty three percent of the people who died, moving
or herding cattle twenty four percent, loading cattle fourteen percent,
and feeding fourteen percent. One third of the deaths were
caused by animals that had previously exhibited aggressive behavior. To
reduce the risk of death from cattle caused injuries, farmers
and ranchers should be aware of and follow recommended practices
for safe livestock handling facilities and proper precautions for working
with cattle, especially cattle that have exhibited aggressiveness, which I'm
assuming if you work out a farm, you probably know
what you're doing.
Speaker 2: I was going to say, are these really the type
of people who are going to listen to the government
on safe handling of their own cows. I don't think so.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean probably not the CD for sure. I
also found a study titled Fatalities Caused by Cattle Dash
four States, and it was between the years two thousand
and three and two thousand and eight, which found that
between Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, and Nebraska, five percent of deaths
which occurred during the production of crops and animals in
the US were caused by cattle.
Speaker 2: Only five percent. Is that that's not as high as
that expect. Where are the other deaths coming from? Where
the other ninety five percent?
Speaker 1: Probably machinery, I guess. Yeah, well, I mean, I'm sure
it's not ninety five percent machinery.
Speaker 2: But no, no, no, no, no, yeah.
Speaker 1: Five percent of deaths in the like Agricultural Department were
caused by cattle specifically, so specifically cows.
Speaker 2: I would still expect to be higher. But hey, yeah, whatever,
it's just.
Speaker 1: In four states, so take that with what you will.
But it also found the majority of the fatalities were
men above the age of sixty again, and most of
them were caused by animals that had previously shown aggressive
behavior again and then data from twenty twenty one found
there to be ninety six cattle ranching related fatal injuries
from that year alone, twenty one. Yeah, thirteen of which
were due to violence or other injuries by animals or people.
Speaker 2: Jesus, Yeah, so there was Wait, you said there was
like twenty something and like a what five year span,
ten year span something like that, and then.
Speaker 1: Yeah, then toenty twenty one, ninety six well fatal injuries.
Speaker 2: Yeah, damn. Yeah.
Speaker 1: There was also a ten year study conducted in Sweden
which was published in nineteen eighty nine titled Fatalities Caused
by Non Venomous Animals and sixteen deaths over the ten
years were caused by cattle, all of which were due
to the animal being aggressive. The study found the herding
of untethered bulls together with cows was especially dangerous and
they recommended it be avoided. I have a lot of
studies here, so I'm just going to keep cuising. I
found another one called Cattle Caused Fatalities in a Province
of Western Turkey nineteen ninety six to twenty ten, autopsy
results which found that for deaths caused by cattle between
nineteen ninety six and twenty ten, ninety four percent of
the deaths were men, and the most cases were between
the age of eighteen to sixty, so adults. I know,
it's like a huge range. And seventy one percent of
the deaths were caused by injuries to the chest, and
most of those resulted in hemneumothorax, which is when blood
and air enter your chest cavity and put pressure around
your lungs. Some other quick ones a study from Finland,
and I can link all these in the episode description
if anyone wants to read some scientific literature. But this
study found cows caused injuries that resulted in death, mainly
by kicking and butting, and they caused the most animal
related deaths, second only to horses. Right yep, dango. And
in a Nigerian study, two children died from cattle, one
from a severe head injury and the other from overwhelming
infection caused by a goring injury.
Speaker 2: Oh gross. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Then in Australia, farming accounts for one in four work
related deaths. Wow, And I know the National Coroner's Information
System has information stored on all Australian deaths reported for
the past twenty six years and they put out a
fact sheet each year. So for twenty twenty four, of
all animal related deaths, and we're talking about Australia, men
accounted for sixty eight percent of the deaths and half
of all deaths occurred in New South Wales and Queensland,
so twenty five percent for each horses killed the most
people in Australia, similar to Finland, which.
Speaker 2: Is not all the venomous animals they have and scary shit.
Speaker 1: Yeah, not crocodiles, not sharks, not jellyfish, yeah, horses damn.
So that was one hundred and twenty seven deaths. But
in spot number two was bovine, so cows, bulls and
other bovines, which accounted for fifteen percent of all animal
related deaths, and they killed eighty two people.
Speaker 2: Oh Jesus.
Speaker 1: Fifty two point four percent were caused by direct contact
with the animal, and thirty four percent of people were
above age sixty five. So we're seeing a trend here
of men above the age of sixty really who are
being killed.
Speaker 2: But like a lot more women in Australia being killed
by cows than you know anywhere else. I wonder why,
I wonder where that is. I wonder if they have
a lot more women in the farming industry. I don't know,
like that's a massive difference.
Speaker 1: I mean men's stall counted for sixty eight percent of
all of the animal related deaths though.
Speaker 2: Yeah, oh is this all animal Okay? I was specifically
the cows. There's only that everyone else in the nineties. Yeah,
that's a massive statistical difference.
Speaker 1: Yeah, math all right. And then to wrap this up,
a study from the Journal of Forensic Science, Medicine and
Pathology titled Death and Injuries Caused by Cattle A forensic
over you found that quote cattle cause significant numbers of
deaths globally and are considered the most dangerous large animal
in Britain. Behavior may be unpredictable, even in apparently docile
domesticated animals, and attacks maybe by a single animal or herd,
and result in injuries from kicking, headbutting, charging, stomping, goring,
and crushing. Cranio Facial injuries may involve fractures of the
spine or skull, with cerebral contusions and lacerations associated with subarachnoid,
subdural and extradural hemorrhages. Chest injuries are also characterized by
fractures which may be multiple with flail, chest hemo, and pneumothorass.
I don't know if I'm pronouncing these right. I'm gonna
hope they're.
Speaker 2: Very large, writes, Hey, go with confidence. You're doing great.
Speaker 1: Thanks. And organ disruption. Injuries to the abdomen in perineum
include intestinal perforations, splenic rupture, pereneal in, vaginal tears, urethral
lacerations and evulsions, and bladder and rectal pers Significant vascular
injuries include complete and partial transsections and lacerations. Males living
in rural areas are most at risk for a fatal encounter.
Speaker 2: Well, they went into a lot of detail.
Speaker 1: They did, and those were big medical words. So I
can once again link that study if you want to
look more into it. But basically, Cols crush you and
Terry open the longer sort of it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that's how they do it.
Speaker 1: So statistics aside, let's finally get into some stories. Hey,
let's start with a story from August tenth, twenty twenty one.
This story takes place in Stockport, which is a town
in Greater Manchester, England. Jill Gilmore and her husband Mark
were walking their dog Finnegan, and they were headed over
a style. Do you know what a style is? I
do not, Yeah, I had to look this up. So
in the UK, it's a structure which allows people passage
through or over a fence wall or hedgerow and farm
animals from doing the same thing.
Speaker 2: Oh interesting, kind.
Speaker 1: Of like steps but like I don't know, so I
first art out six stairs but it's like a specific
to keep cattle out, So okay. Despite this style, there
was no fencing to keep the live stock away from
the public though, so it's confusing, but essentially the public
was still allowed to interact with the cattle and like
by that, I mean the cattle can like get to people.
Speaker 2: It seems like the style is like to go into
the pasture and like then once you're in there, you're
in honestly, yeah, yeah that's what sounds like. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So but they're on a public walking path, right, so
like they're not doing anything wrong. This is just how
it goes. They head over this style and Jill was
ahead of Mark and Finnigan was on a short leash
with Jill, so as they went over, a group of
cows appeared and one charged. Jill said she let go
of Finnegan's leash and tried to run away, but she
fell and the herd of twenty to thirty cows began
to attack her. Oh all she remembered was hooves hitting her,
and she accepted that she was dying. She said. She relaxed,
just accepting her fate essentially. Then her husband Mark ran
up and yelled at her to get up. Mark recalls
that the cows were quote jumping up and down on Jill,
and he threw his belongings at them in an attempt
to get them to stop. He leaned down to help
her once the cows had dispersed, and she wrapped her
arms around his neck and he dragged her out of
the area under a broken piece of fence. So after
she had been gored, essentially, he quickly tried to help
them out of the field, but Jill told him to
leave her there to die. Of course he didn't, as
any good husband would. Yeah, that's crazy, and when he
got her to safety, she was airlifted from the scene
in Hazel Grove to a hospital. She was conscious, but
she had fractures to her spine, neck, breaks in her
arms and legs, a dozen broken ribs, and a broken
pelvis and suffered punctured lungs. Oh Jesus, she needed multiple
surgeries and had to be in a wheelchair for five months.
Speaker 2: Damn.
Speaker 1: And she didn't leave the hospital until October. Oh my god,
all this happened in August.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Oh, she got sucked up.
Speaker 1: Thankfully, she was able to recover enough that she could
go back to work. But in twenty twenty four, she
began telling the media how she continues to struggle physically
and psychologically, and Mark, her husband, also continues to struggle
mentally as well in the wake of this attack.
Speaker 2: Yeah scary, yeah.
Speaker 1: Jill said. Quote and while nothing can change what I
suffered that day, I hope that by sharing my story,
I can help prevent it happening to anyone else. Farmers
have a responsibility to keep their cattle in the public safe,
and walkers need to know the potential risks out there
so they can be prepared or make a conscious decision
to avoid them, meaning the cows. Her lawyers said the
Farmers Insurance have accepted full responsibility and have made funds
available to cover the cost of her extensive physical and
psychological rehabilitation.
Speaker 2: What things did the farmer do wrong?
Speaker 1: Didn't keep his cows away from people wall.
Speaker 2: They crossed the thing to go into the pasture.
Speaker 1: It sounds like, but there were still like that's I
think confusing for us being Americans. I think that there's
like a disconnect. As I was reading more stories, there
seems to be a lot of public walking paths that
happened to like be in fields or around fields, but
the farmers still have an obligation to like fence off
their cattle from like accessing the people. Okay, this will
make more sense as we go on. Okay, so let's
speaking of move on to another story. And this victim
was inspired to share their story because of the story
we just talked about.
Speaker 2: No shit. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So in June sixth of twenty twenty four, sixty four
year old David McKay, a retired veteran, was walking his
four dogs on the Isle of Wight, an island off
the south coast of England. He and the dogs walked
along a coastal path and then through a field between
the pepper Pot and Pan Lane near Knighton Knitton and
I t o n but there's some wild names in
this way. Yeah, things are spelled crazy over there. I
say that we totally we live in New England where
we have towns like Worcester. Yeah, we also stole a
bunch of names from the English as we came over whatever. Anyways,
Yeah we have in Manchester here. Yeah, we also live
in New Hampshire.
Speaker 2: No, we're the original, but that's all lies.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's not why we called it new at all.
Like two leagues that come up with a new thing.
Let's just we're new that old place, correct, hence New England. Anyways,
So as David was walking with his dogs along the
edge of a field where he knew there was cattle,
he put the dogs on short leads so they wouldn't
antagonize the cows. But the calves in the group apparently
became interested in the dogs, and it wasn't long before
a cow charged and knocked David to the ground. David
let the dogs go and said, quote, then all the
other cows led into the attack, and I was trying
to keep my feet, but they just trampled me, circled
me and pushed me down.
Speaker 2: No shot, you're staying on your feet when they're coming.
Speaker 1: After you, he said, quote speed of the attack and
the determination of the cows to knock me down and
trample me was astonishing. He struggled against the herds onslaught,
but eventually crawled his way farther out of the field,
and the cows eventually lost interest once again. This guy's
a veterinarian, right, so he knew he was really badly
injured after this, and he said if he hadn't gotten
help within twenty minutes of the attack that he would die. Ooh,
so he called nine ninety nine, which is the emergency
number instead of nine to one one, and he called
his wife. Hampshire Elwell and Isle of White air ambulance
eventually found him from the air and a team of
emergency medical personnel on foot rushed to his aid before
flying him to Southampton General Hospital. Three of his dogs,
Olive Patches and Willow, were found shortly after the attack,
but it took four hours to locate his last dog, Ernie,
who was blind. Yeah, but they did all safely make
it home event.
Speaker 2: Okay, good just wandering around a field with fucking killer cows.
Speaker 1: Yeah, poor Ernie. There's also a picture of David with
Ernie and it's very cute.
Speaker 2: What kind of dogs?
Speaker 1: Uh? At least I only saw Ernie. He just looked
to be kind of like a mutt. Okay, yeah, we
love mutts.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: He spent ten days in intensive care with a collapse, lung,
bleeding in his chest, twelve ribs broken, and multiple fractures
all over his body. He said, quote, with hindsight, you
could say I shouldn't have walked through, but I had
done it many times before and it was public. I
don't feel that I was being irresponsible really. He also
said he was surprised because as a vet, he thought
he knew how to behave around animals like cows, but
was just so surprised at their aggression.
Speaker 2: And you brought predators around grazing animals. That's usually not
a good idea.
Speaker 1: Well, he wrote in a letter to The Guardian, quote,
we need to work with farmers to reduce risks, and
work with walkers to raise awareness. My final recommendation is
to support your local Air Ambulance, which is run as
a private charity. As without the Hampshire and Isle of
Whight Service, I would not be here to write this
letter today.
Speaker 2: That's it's expensive private charity. That's that's big. Yeah.
Speaker 1: We talked about that recently in another episode. I can't
remember now, maybe it was a bear attack, but it
was someone got airlifted from like a charity thing. I
think it was a bear attack our last episode actually yeah, yeah, yeah,
I remember that. Yeah, wow, crazy that were like hmm
when was that? Oh? Last a month ago. So from
what I've been finding, the issue of cattle attacking walkers
in the UK has been an ongoing issue for years now, apparently,
as I discovered through the research. And I discovered this
especially through a website called killercows dot co dot uk,
which is created by a group called Cows, which stands
for Concern over Walker's Safety.
Speaker 2: All right, that's pretty good acronyms, So good for that
effective appreciate seriously, Yeah, I mean now they owned the
acronym cow. I mean now the fucking farmers can't take it.
Speaker 1: All members of the group have been cornered or attacked
by cows while walking, and although not a political group
or really even an official organization, they're trying to collect
stories and raise awareness to make walking in the UK
more safe from cows. As we heard in the last
two stories, obviously they pose a very serious threat. So
let's keep going with another story from the UK, this
one from twenty twenty fifty seven year old Michael Holmes
is walking on September twenty ninth, twenty twenty with his
wife Teresa and their daughter's two dogs, which were whippets.
But I could not find the names of the dogs
or pictures of them. Unfortunately, I've never even heard of
that type of dog, a whippet. No, they're like little
mini greyhounds. Oh really yeah, ooh yeah, very cute. So
it was just Michael, Theresa, the two dogs, and they
were on a path at Hollinghurst Farm in Netherton Wakefield, England.
Similar to the other two stories, the cows and calves
were not separated from the walking path. There was also
no signage indicating there were cows with calves in the area.
There was a sign at the bottom of the field, however,
that said quote these fields produce your food, clean up
after your dog. Please keep your dog in sight and
under control. So the homes did have their dogs on
short leads, very much under their control, and like I said,
whippets smaller dogs. So the couple, who had been childhood
sweethearts married for thirty four years, yeah, made their way
up a steep hill unaware there was a herd of
cows at the top. Now, the couple did know that
there were sometimes cattle present in the area, but Teresa said, quote,
there were times when we'd seen them and decided to
not go in the field because I don't want to
cross a field I know has got cattle. In CCTV
footage from nearby revealed that as the couple and the
two dogs continued on the path, a herd of cows
approached them from behind, then accelerated and attacked. The two
were trampled, and in the process they let go of
the dog's leashes, and the dogs managed to run off
and escape injury, but unfortunately, Michael sustained fatal chest injuries
from the trampling and died at the scene.
Speaker 2: Oh my god.
Speaker 1: Weeks later, Teresa awoke in a hospital with no memory
of how she got there or what happened.
Speaker 2: Oh God.
Speaker 1: The cows had fractured a few of her ribs and
crushed part of her spine, leaving her permanently paralyzed from
the waist down. She said to investigators, quote, I was
just really confused. I couldn't work out why I was there,
and my daughters eventually had to explain that they had
lost their dad.
Speaker 2: Oh fuck.
Speaker 1: Along with losing her husband and her ability to walk,
Theresa had to quit her job at the Lead City Council.
In a victim statement, she said, quote having to cope
with two traumas has been very difficult. I am paralyzed
from the waist down. I now have to use a wheelchair.
This has transformed my life beyond anything I could ever imagine.
The course of my life and my late husband's has
been thrown into great turmoil as a result of the
farmer's negligence. Also, for those wondering, the dogs were found
hours after the attack by neighbor and are completely fine.
Speaker 2: Gut.
Speaker 1: The owner of the cows and the farm, Martin Mitchell,
was brought to trial for Teresa's injuries in Michael's death.
An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive found that
Martin Mitchell had failed to ensure the cows were suitably
segregated from the right of way. They stated, quote readily
available HSE guidances states that where possible, cows with calves
should not be graised in fields where there is a
public right of way. Where this is not possible, they
should be segregated from the footpath by appropriate fencing and
where it is reasonable to do so. Upon investigation into
the attack on Michael and Theresa, two other people came
forward and said that four months before Michael's death and
the attack on Teresa, they had also been chased by
cows in the same field. John Burgess said he suffered
four broken ribs and quote quite severe bruising after being
attacked in June twenty twenty. He said he hadn't realized
the cattle were there because it had been foggy that day.
The second person charged, Natalie Bain, said she had quote
never been back in the field since a terrifying near
miss with stampeding cattle and August of twenty twenty. Both
John and Natalie had leashed dogs with them at the time.
Martin She'll pleaded guilty to breaching Section three of the
Health and Safety at Work Act nineteen seventy four. He
was given a six month suspended prison sentence and was
ordered to pay a five hundred pounds fine and make
a contribution of thirty five hundred pounds towards costs.
Speaker 2: That's it, Yeah, damn all right, hey, I mean I
mean they have, you know, public health care, so I
guess the cost to her definitely wasn't what would be
in America obviously hopefully.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I guess the payment for injuries, like you know, medical costs,
and maybe as high, but you'd think he'd give up
a little bit more. Is insurance or something? Yeah, damn?
Speaker 1: Or maybe like lending to funeral costs or like cost
of transitioning. I don't know. Yeah, I mean she lost
her job and her husband. Ye other source of income
is dead, Oh my god.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then actually, before we get to her next story,
let's take a quick ad, all right, and then another
story out of the UK from twenty twenty two. On
September ninth of that year, twenty twenty two, twenty nine
year old Rebecca Morris, also known as Becky, was walking
her dog, a Chihuahua named Zero. What do have pictures of?
In a field at Warwick Bridge Farm in Little Thorpe, Leicestershire, England.
Little Thorpe, very cute, very quaint sounding place for what's
about to happen. It was just before nine pm when
she was walking, and we know this because she took
a picture some cows in the field and texted to
her mom with the caption cows with a zee, but
that was the last message her family received for hours.
After becoming concerned, her family went to find her and
found her on the ground in the field with fatal
injuries to her chest.
Speaker 2: Oh no.
Speaker 1: They attempted life saving measures, but Becky went into cardiac
arrest and passed away at ten twenty one pm. Her
little dog Zero was found nearby in the street, unharmed,
still wearing his leash. A forensic pathologist who completed the
post mortem exam on Becky said that she died from
abdominal injuries quote consistent with a large, heavy creature, and
that there were hoof prints on her chest. The inquest
heard that Becky's body had been found quote some way
from the designated footpath, but no one was really sure,
like why she deviated from the footpath that much. I
was probably being chased by fucking cows, That's kind of
what I was thinking. Yeah, Like there was something maybe
making her uncomfortable and that's why she kind of went
off the path. But toxicology reports showed that she had
quote a social level of alcohol in her system. I
have no idea what it wants. But they also said
alongside that there was her prescription medication like in her system,
but a doctor said that that wouldn't have really had
any impact on her actions, So take that with what
you will. In a statement by her family during the trial,
they said Becky was quote an all around beautiful person.
Becky was always there to help others, even when she
was unwell herself. She loved all animals and was vegan.
She loved zero, her chihuahua, and her rabbits. They were
her babies. Upon conclusion of the trial, her family said,
quote nothing will help us overcome the loss of Becky.
We are satisfied with the conclusion which the jury have found.
Our beautiful daughter, Becky went for a short walk with
her chihuahua on a summer's evening and never came home.
Becky's death was preventable. The law needs to change the
rules and guidelines in place and need to be more robust,
and it needs to be enforced. This is happening time
and time again. How many more people have to be killed?
End quote? So from what I found, this investigation still
seems to be ongoing because evidence was also given that
this herd of cattle were typically easy going and non aggressive,
but regardless. The Health and Safety executives sent the owners
of the cattle notice legally requiring them to take action
against the herd. So the owners put up an electric
fence to separate them from the public.
Speaker 2: Well that's good, a little late, but.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So literally all of the stories we just talked
about were from the UK. All of them included dogs.
All of them included being on like public property so
to speak, and farmers not separating their cattle from the public.
And it was all cows, and it seemed to be
all cows that had calves present. So it seems like
the obvious answer is that dogs are instigating. But in
Becky's case, her family said, because of how tall the
grass was and how small zero is, it's very unlikely
the cattle even saw zero to begin with.
Speaker 2: They can smell the smell dogs.
Speaker 1: I guess.
Speaker 2: Also, why are we putting walking paths through pastures?
Speaker 1: Like that's what I want to I don't understand.
Speaker 2: I guess like public grazing land is a thing here too,
like and I don't see a lot of walking paths
going through them. Obviously it's a much big area, but
public freezing is a fairly normal thing.
Speaker 1: Well, and I'm not sure how it works in the UK,
like public grazing. It seems like these people were walking
on public land, so like, are you allowed to have
your cattle on public land? But it seems like there
are rules in place that you're supposed to keep them separate.
Speaker 2: But yeah, so I don't know, how are you supposed
to put up a fence?
Speaker 1: Like that's what I mean, That's what I don't understand.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that's obviously it's a whole different, you know,
system over there, so it's hard to for us to know. Yeah,
I don't know why you would put a walking path through,
like because at no point has there been any like, oh,
the cow was born supposed to be there, Like, no,
they're they're supposed to be there, that's where they fucking eat.
So I don't know. It's just weird.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's interesting that most of these stories were from
the UK as well, because as I was looking up
stuff for this episode, I like, I found some stories
out of the US, but they were like overwhelmingly from
the UK, So it seems like it's specific. The UK
has like a consistent problem with people walking, and cow's
just attacking people who are walking, like there were so
many more stories I didn't write down that we could
have talked about. But yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, in my experience here, I don't have
a whole lot o desire to be anywhere near cows,
like especially when they're out just growing in a field
like we have it. I have no point, am I
were like, I'm going to go running through this fucking path.
It's like a joke in like movies, a lot of
popular movies. It's like, oh, we're going to run to
this log of pasture and fuck with the cows and
they're going to chase us around like it's a known thing,
like they don't want to get looking around. Yeah, it's
in cars, like in the movie cars getting chased around
by a tractor cow. It's yeah, I mean it just
seems like pretty obvious. Don't go messing around, or don't
you don't want to be around the nine hundred pound animal.
Speaker 1: See, But in these cases it's not their faulty didn't
know the cattle were there.
Speaker 2: Well again, if it's public grazing land, yeah, but also
if it's a public walking path's so true, so true,
so true, so true. Yeah, that seems where where my
question is like why would there be a walking path?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it seems like a more systemic issue of why
are we putting our walking paths? But also the UK
is like there's a ton of farmland and field, so
I don't know if it's maybe just there's literally no
other space to put your walking paths or what, but
clearly it is a systemic issue and people are dying
because of it at like a pretty alarming rate. Yeah,
there's been So if you go to that website, the
Killer Cow's website, they have a huge collection of stories
from the past I'd say like ten years of people
like writing in like hey, I was attacked by this
cow and got like broken ribs, or they talk about
people dying, and Becky's family actually wrote into the website
telling her story. So it's if you're in the area
and you're like worried about this kind of thing, it's
a good resource, I guess to kind of keep an
eye on where things are happening. But they're trying to
do more outreach on like changing laws and things like
that to enforce not having cows just able to go
after people who are walking.
Speaker 2: But yeah, i'd also like to know that statistics sound
like how many obviously all the ones we just talked
about had dogs, About how many in total involved having
a dog?
Speaker 1: Yeah? So I mean there was another story that I
didn't like write all the notes down on, but there
was like a seventy something year old man who was
just crossing a street. A cow had escaped a market
and just killed him and then ran off, like it
just trampled him to death and ran off. Yeah, so
it and he was just walking across the street. No dog,
just a dude.
Speaker 2: So they're prey animals, like they when they freak out,
fight or flight, and sometimes the flight happens to be
through somebody. Well, I mean in that instance of the
guy being trampled, it like specifically like killed, I'm coming
after you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for like no reason.
Speaker 2: They are big, dumb animals. I don't trust them.
Speaker 1: And in this episode we're just this is just talking
about cows like female cattle. This isn't even talking about bulls,
Like we could have a whole other episode on bulls,
which I'm sure we will hole their episode on horses
and pigs like we this could be a big rabbit hole.
Speaker 2: That we jumped down that Yeah, pigs would be scary,
big and smart and scary.
Speaker 1: Well, I was so. In researching for this, I read
something that was like, yeah, it's hard to really ascertain,
like how often pigs kill people because they also will
eat them.
Speaker 2: Oh Jesus, we've gone wild board before, right we have.
Speaker 1: We also did cover a story of a guy who
got mauled by his pig. Actually, no, it was a warthog.
Never mind, Yeah, close enough.
Speaker 2: Oh God, they're all pigs, yeah, pigs and pigs a pig. No,
it's just cows are scary. I don't know. I don't,
I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't like you don't like cows.
Speaker 2: I mean I like cows from a distance, like driving
by and yelling cows like about the window. I like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what is the human urge to just like yell
cows at cows?
Speaker 2: They're cows.
Speaker 1: They know that, do they fair?
Speaker 2: All? Right?
Speaker 1: So before we go, there is one more aspect of
this that I want to touch on. Aside from cows
attacking you, there of course other ways who can be
harmed by them, and that is especially through zoonotic disease.
There's one in particular that's a huge concern right now,
not just for cattle, but for a lot of wild
animal species, and it is looking like it's coming to
humans more as well, and that is highly pathogenic avian
influenza also known as HPAI, the bird flu or H
five N one. This is not brand new like H
five N one. There's been outbreaks before. Bird flu has
been around for a long time, but the specific strain
that we're talking about now has been really scary frankly
for the past year. Nick, have you heard anything about
the bird flu recently?
Speaker 2: No, I don't think I have.
Speaker 1: So that's why I want to talk about it, because
I mean, I'm also in a conservation medicine class right now,
so we're like, we're talking about zoonotic diseases and like
the interface between humans and wild life and domestic animals
and how those are transmitted. But I'm also working with
wild animals. So this has been like a huge topic
for us, but I think, like the general public, it's
not as common knowledge currently, so I wanted to get
into it a little bit just so people can stay
informed as to what's going on. The most recent outbreak
of bird flu in cattle was first reported on March
twenty fifth, twenty twenty four. And this is the first
time the bird flu has been documented in cattle. Oh
really yeah, so it has made the jump from birds
to cattle dan which is alarming. Since twenty twenty two, though,
the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service so APHIS
has detected this virus in over two hundred mammals. The
CDC's page on the bird flu was most recently updated
on February sixth, So really recently. And there are now
nine hundred and fifty nine dairy herds infected with HPAI
across sixteen states.
Speaker 2: And they just found the first case last year. Yeah,
less than a year ago, eleven months ago. Yeah, Jesus yep.
Speaker 1: On April first of twenty twenty four, the CDC confirmed
one human HPAI infection in a person with exposure to
dairy cows who are presumed to be infected with the
virus in Texas. This is thought to be the first
instance of likely mammal to human spread of the bird
flu virus. While that's good, it's it's learning it's hoppin,
which is typically a sign that things are not going well. No. So,
mammals are typically infected when they eat infected birds, poultry,
or other animals and or if they are exposed to
environments contaminated with the virus. And this is also why
we're seeing such high egg prices right now, because, as
you can imagine, for farmers who have like huge poultry flocks,
this is a crazy thing to manage against because it
is so infectious and deadly and can spread really, really easily,
even if you're taking like some of the best precautions
that you can between birds.
Speaker 2: So yeah, I feel like you just have to call
the entire flock.
Speaker 1: I thought, literally you literally do.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So, the CDC says the risk to the general public
is low right now, but for people who work closely
with animals that could be infected, we are at higher risk.
And I say we because even for people who work
with captive animals like in a zoo like I do,
or a research setting, there is a risk. This is
a huge topic at our facility right now because we
have a lot of birds of prey and two mountain lions,
which is a concern because there have been a lot
of animals at zoo's dying from the bird flu, like
one animal sanctuary in Washington that lost half of their
animals to the virus. In December of twenty twenty four,
including four mountain lions and one tiger, and none of
their animals had direct contact with each other, like obviously
within one exhibit, if they were housed together they did,
but like the tiger, didn't have any contact with the
birds or the mountain lions.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 1: In fact, what led people to discover the virus and
cattle in the first place last year was actually the
death of barn cats, which is even more reason to
keep your cats inside. There have been reports of domestic
cats dying from it because they also were eating like
a raw food diet. So even if you keep your
cat fully indoors, maybe don't feed them rough food right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Signs of HPAI and cats include fever, lethargy, heavy discharge
from the eyes and the nose, respiratory distress, and neurological issues.
But of course these can also be symptoms of other
things like rabies or distemper So if you're seeing any
sort of illness from your cat, contact EVET.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, that's good advice in general.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So, according to the CDC quote, sick animals maybe
able to transmit influenza virus to people in their saliva,
feces or droppings, and other bodily fluids. Human infections can
occur when the virus is inhaled or gets into a
person's eyes, nose, or mouth. This can happen when the
virus is in the air in droplets or dust and
a person breathes it in, or when a person touches
something that has virus on it and then touches their mouth, eyes,
or nose. The reported signs and symptoms of bird flu
virus infections and humans have ranged from no symptoms or
mild too severe. These symptoms could include eye redness, so conjunctivitis,
mild flu like, upper respiratory symptoms, pneumonia requiring hospitalization, a
fever so temperature of one hundred degrees fahrenheit or greater
or thirty seven point eight degrees celsius, or feeling feverish, cough,
sore throat, runnier, stuff he knows, muscle or body aches, headaches, fatigue,
shortness of breath or difficulty breathing, and less common signs
and symptoms include diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, or seizures, but a
fever may not always be present. I feel like it's
always so hard when symptoms are out because I'm like,
I have stuff. He knows every day, my body hurts
all the time.
Speaker 2: I was gonna say, like, how is this any different
than just the normal flu?
Speaker 1: Like I mean I think, like, yeah, valid point. But
the concern, and similar to like what made COVID nineteen
a pandemic, is its ability to spread and mutate quickly.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because we different species immunization to it or are
you know, immune systems aren't built up to fight specifically
this virus. Now I get that.
Speaker 1: There's also no vaccine, so obviously there's a flu vaccine,
but it does not protect you against the bird flu.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean there's a lot of flues out there, right,
It's like the flu vaccine doesn't cover all of them,
so even when you get it, you're still at risk.
So yep, no, that makes sense. But so when those
animals and organ had Washington, when those that was damn weird,
how I get the wrong statem? I'm so close? Yeah,
So when they all died, like did all the meat
come from the same facility? Is that how all of
them got killed? Like they all caught it from the
same packaging facility or something.
Speaker 1: I don't know, and I'm almost inclined to say no,
because then I think we would have had more information
from like other people who had used that distributor for me,
you know what I mean? Oh yeah, yeah, what I'm
assuming is and the biggest concern, which I'm about to
do like a whole literature review on for my conservation
medical class, because this is what we have to do,
like a semester long project, and mine is like the
interface of actual wild animals versus captive wild animals like
in my case, the mountain lions birds of prey, because
for our mountain lions, like, yeah, there's a roof on
their enclosure, but birds can still poop in there, and
small birds like songbirds can still get in there, and
the mountain lions could kill them and get it that way.
And then for other birds like our birds of prey
who are outside, like we have a bunch of turkeys
that walk around and can easily go up to the exhibits,
and then same thing. Other birds can get in through
the roof or poop into the enclosure. So it's for
facility like ours who are smaller or just you know,
other facilities who don't have the money or the means
to like move their birds inside. And also like we're
a zoo. The whole point is the public coming to
look at these things and learn about them. So it's
a really hard thing to navigate and to protect your
animals against when you're like the birds could go anywhere,
Like you're fighting against birds that can just do whatever
and go anywhere.
Speaker 2: Just fly around, do whatever, Yeah they want.
Speaker 1: I think that's what makes it so hard with the
bird flu specifically too, is because I mean in humans realistically, nowadays,
a virus can travel across the world in like twelve
hours yep, and birds can go anywhere. So I think
that's what makes it so scary. But I don't mean
to be an alarmist or scare people. It's just something
to keep our eye on, because I think if COVID
taught us anything it's that we should be more proactive
trying to stop pandemics rather than reactive. So if we
could all keep our eye on it and watch for signs,
it'd be great.
Speaker 2: Yeah. The scary part to me is definitely the mammal
to mammal yeah effect, or the change it's head that
that's that's not good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, swapping host species is always like a huge red flag.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So anyways, that was and just a short little tangent
into a highly pythogenic even influenza. And yeah, I'm hoping
we can do some more like domestic species coming up.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I feel like we cover a lot of wild animals
because those are like the like ooh so scary being
attacked by I almost said that, Yeah, I mean realistically,
like those are the stories that like get people's attention.
But I mean, how many people are killed by fucking
horses a lot? So yeah, we'll get into it.
Speaker 2: Have ever shown you that video of like the two
horses that are there, there's a stud about to mount
and then the female horse kicks them in the head
and kills them. Yeah, you have to show me that
fucking nuts terrifying. It's your gunshot. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Oh have you ever seen also on Nature's Metal, because
I've that's where that video is from.
Speaker 2: Yes, it is.
Speaker 1: Did you see the video of the horse that picks
up a sheep and just throws it in the air
and kill it, plays with it. It haunts my nightmares.
Horses are so scary, No.
Speaker 2: They're They're terrifying. Absolutely terrifying. Yeah, so strong, impressive. Okay, well,
maybe next we do a horse. Episode's gonna say, Yeah,
it seems we were in that way where we done Moose.
I keep asking this, have we done moose yet?
Speaker 1: We did our very first bonus episode, we did moose
and deer, and people keep asking about moose and deer,
so well, definitely we can touch on them again.
Speaker 2: I knew, I knew that I was testing you. Yeah.
Hm cool. I have a great memory of all of
the things we've talked about.
Speaker 1: Nick. We could barely remember our last episode.
Speaker 2: I can barely remember why it did like two days ago.
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, Well, thank you all so much for listening.
Thank you for keeping up with us. I know it's
our output of episodes is random now, but I appreciate
you hanging in there. Oh. I did want to say
because someone messaged me like i' miss hearing your voice,
which is first of all, so nice.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: I for the first time last week, UH streamed to
Twitch a gaming session.
Speaker 2: I did.
Speaker 1: Really Yeah, So I if anyone is into like watching
people play video games, I have a Twitch that I'll
link at the episode description. My username is bray Bashing,
which I have come to find out, sounds like gay bashing,
which was not my intention when I made that tag
or like that user name whatever. When I was like
twelve years old. My last name is Bray, so I
was like, oh, that's so cool. I'm like bashing the competition.
So don't get that idea.
Speaker 2: Is that like a thing? Like, is that like a
term that people use? It is?
Speaker 1: I apparently, and I didn't. I didn't know, So just
know that it's it's not that yeah anyways, I in
that the episode description. Otherwise, you can find links to
our social media and our website in our episode description
as well. Thank you to my good friend and second
grade husband Joshuall for making our intro music and for
teaching me how to stream a twitch in the first place.
Thank you so much to Jesse for editing. And also
if you are going back and listening to older episodes,
I'm not sure how it works if you have the
episodes downloaded or not, but Jesse is helping us kind
of like revamp older episodes and update the yeah, update
the audio levels because I know some people have complained
about that. I totally get it, So thank you Jesse
for doing that, and we'll be back at some point
with the next episode, Bruce Bye.