Chilling 911 Call
55 year old single mother Charla Nash was attacked by a chimpanzee last February while helping her friend corral the ‘pet’ back into her house. The animal was shot and killed by police but not before it savagely mauled Ms. Nash, leaving her with horrifying injuries as some saw when she appeared on yesterday’s Oprah Winfrey show. Her injuries are profound and include severe mutilation of her face and the loss of both eyes and both hands (except for one partial digit on her right hand).
At first, watching Charla discuss her injuries was disturbing until her character and resilience became apparent and I almost forgot she was so profoundly disfigured. Shortly after watching the show I listened to the original 911 call placed by her friend Sandra Herold during the attack which gave me some idea what this woman lived through. I can only imagine.
Be warned that this audio is extremely disturbing, in fact it’s one of the most horrific 911 calls I’ve ever heard.
I will spare myself the horror of listening to the call. I have read about similar chimp attacks and I have worked with these and other animals. It’s not clear from your post here if this was a so called domesticated animal or a zoo animal or what, but I would be interested to know if any research has been done into the particular mental disorder that makes people think they can adopt a chimp, treat it like a human and expect it to reciprocate. The same disorder applies to people who attemp to domesticate other dangerous animals such as reptiles and pit bulls.