By Rozina Shaw, Grade 7
On Tuesday, November 24th, at roughly 8:00 AM, the new PE teacher at Valemount Elementary school was walking on her daily route to school—down the back alley dirt road beside the old baseball diamond—when she noticed two unusual dogs barking from a distance. As she continued, the barking progressively got louder until, out of nowhere, two large dogs appeared from the trees. One was a bronze-brown ridgeback boxer mix without any visible collar, and the other dog was an older heavy-looking Husky. The boxer growled and approached her aggressively as she was minding her own business. It jumped on her, knocking her down. The teacher felt helpless as the boxer viciously bit her left leg through her snow pants in two different spots. It grabbed her snow pants and dragged her for a short period of time, before following the husky back into the snowy forest.
Two witnesses watched it happen and helped her after the dogs had left. In shock, she limped the rest of the way to the school, and was dismissed to go to the clinic with a major injury.
After a long day, she decided it would be a good idea to report the dogs to the RCMP, considering that many kids walk down that same path everyday.
The RCMP found out that this one particular dog had been reported various times, but unfortunately, they could not help and told her to try calling the Village. The Village told her there was nothing that could be done, considering the town doesn’t have an animal control officer.
Many locals in town approached the teacher informing her that the desperation of this dog is similar to many incidents in the past, where a boxer fitting the same description had killed cats, bit kids’ hands, and not to mention the obvious biting adults too.
This town needs to come together to fight for the community’s safety and for the dog owners to take responsibility. Let’s remember to keep our dogs on leash and be careful when walking alone and to possibly carry bear spray with you at all times because you never know what might jump out from the bushes on your daily walking routine.
See related story here: Teacher bit by dog calls for better animal control.
(Edited for grammar/clarity)
