70-year-old woman saved herself from fox attack in Union County

UNION COUNTY, N.C. — A 70-year-old woman is recovering after an unorthodox guest came into her home.

Kathy Hazelwood, from Union County, said a fox came in through her front door early on Monday morning and bit her more than a dozen times.

Hazelwood told Channel 9′s Jonathan Lowe, she was opening her door to check on her outdoor cats when the fox came in and attacked her.

“I had opened up the door and went shoo, shoo, he came in,” Hazelwood said.

But luckily, Hazelwood can think on the fly and did something that wouldn’t cross a lot of mind during an animal attack.

“I just reached down and I grabbed him on each side of the neck and took my elbow and opened up the door and threw him out,” she said.

County Health Officials who spoke to Hazelwood just a day later said unprovoked fox attacks on humans are pretty rare and said she needed to start a round of rabies shots as soon as possible.

“The series that I got at the hospital, the ones that he had to put around the wounds, he told they would be very painful, and they were,” Hazelwood told Lowe.

Lieutenant James Maye from the Union County Sheriff’s Office says the Animal Services Unit is now looking for the grey fox that attacked Hazelwood.

“In a case like this, with the fox biting the victim and then running away, we definitely like to try to locate and find that fox so we could have it tested,” Maye said.

Although Hazelwood is a bit worried about the fox coming back, she’s not second-guessing her quick thinking and bravery that stopped the attack.

“I don’t know what gave me the energy to do that but I picked him up and slung him out the door,” Hazelwood said.

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