Mary Gural needed 98 stitches to treat bites from her wrist to elbow after the dog pounced on her Sunday outside a fast-food restaurant.
The attack follows separate pit bull attacks on two young B.C. children in late August that prompted calls for a ban on the dogs in the province.
In the Kamloops case, RCMP Staff Sgt. Grant Learned said a 27-year-old friend of the dog's owner who was looking after the female Rottweiler had left it outside a McDonald's on Sunday when it attacked Gural as she left the restaurant with her husband.
"I said to my husband, 'I don't like the looks of that dog,' " Gural said as she recalled the attack. "Next thing I knew, [it] was flying at me."
Gural said the attack happened so fast, she has little recollection of it. "Luckily, I put my arm up. Otherwise, [it] would have had my face," she said.
She was thankful for the crowd of people who pulled the dog off her and for a McDonald's employee who looked after her wound until paramedics came. "It happened so fast, I don't think I felt the pain when it was biting me," she said.
Learned said that on June 1, the Rottweiler was reported to have bitten postal carrier Ken Leblanc at its owner's home.
Leblanc's wife, Patricia Nauss, said her husband's left arm had bone-deep puncture wounds from wrist to elbow, as well as scrape marks from the dog's teeth.
"They promised us the dog would be kept in a special cage," she said.
The dog was surrendered to the city by its owner. Bylaw enforcement supervisor John Ramsey said it will be destroyed.
In the earlier attacks, Emma-Leigh Cranford of White Rock had 40 stitches and two hours of surgery to repair a facial wound after a pit bull attacked her during a barbecue in late August.
Her mother, Elizabeth Cranford, said she wants to see a local or provincial ban on the dogs.
Also in August, local media reported a three-year-old Kelowna boy received 32 stitches in his face after he reached down to pet a pit bull.
(Vancouver Sun - Sept 6, 2012)
