Hero dad Ian O'Reilly kills rabid coyote with bare hands

A rabid coyote that attacked several people in New Hampshire met its match in the dad of a 2-year-old boy who killed the sickly predator with his bare hands. This tale is a great tribute to the fierce determination of a father’s love. Heroic dad Ian O’Reilly went to great lengths to protect his child and now he’s become a bit of a national legend.

Dad Killed Coyote With His Bare Hands

Ian O’Reilly was walking with his three children in Kensington, NH when the coyote went after his young son. The lone coyote attempted to pull down the child by biting his jacket. The boy’s father didn’t stand idly by waiting for someone else to do something.

Instead, a fierce parental instinct kicked in. First, the dad tried to kick the coyote to cause him to flee. When the animal refused to back down, O’Reilly took the coyote down himself and suffocated it. About ten minutes after the ordeal began, the animal was dead.

O’Reilly did not escape the attack without injury. The coyote bit him twice during the encounter. He received bites on his chest and forearm before subduing the animal.

It was an odd experience for a man who had never harmed an animal before, but of course he was not going to allow that coyote to harm anyone else.

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“I was able to get its head into the snow and get my hand around its snout, so it could no longer bite me,” the hero dad said. “And then, from there, I was able to suffocate it by using my body weight and scissor-locking it until basically expiring.”

Coyote Tests Positive For Rabies

O’Reilly’s encounter with the coyote is believed to be the coyote’s third attack that morning alone. It first attacked a motorist. Then a 62-year-old woman was the animal’s second victim. She was sitting on the porch with her dogs when the coyote bit her and both of her dogs.

O’Reilly and the woman were both given rabies shots at the hospital and the woman’s dogs both went to the vet for treatment.

Coyotes typically travel in packs, but this one was alone adding to the mystery. The Cujo wannabe coyote tested positive for rabies. So officials now expect that more animals in the Exeter area will turn up with the disease.

“Based on all the evidence we have collected and in talking with several people who recently reported seeing coyotes acting erratically, we don’t believe this is the only coyote in the Exeter area that may have rabies,” said Colonel Kevin Jordan, with the Fish and Game law enforcement division said.

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An interview with this heroic dad can be seen below.

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