LOS ANGELES | A 21-year-old man was killed by a cougar in California, the first fatal attack in this western American state since 2004, according to local authorities.
Taylen Brooks died Saturday after being attacked by the big cat, which lives in the wild in California, while his 18-year-old brother, Wyatt Brooks, was injured in the face, the county sheriff’s office said of El Dorado in a Monday Facebook post.
The two brothers were walking along an unpaved road in Georgetown, northeastern California, looking for deer antlers, when a cougar, also known as a mountain lion, appeared.
“Taylen and Wyatt did what they were always taught, they raised their arms in the air to make themselves appear bigger” and shouted at the feline, with Wyatt even throwing his backpack at the animal to try to make him go away.
But instead, the cougar lunged at the two brothers and after a struggle on the ground, managed to bite Taylen in the neck.
Wyatt, suffering “severe lacerations to his face,” walked away to make an emergency call.
A search was launched to find his brother and the police discovered “a cougar crouching near an individual on the ground”.
Shots to scare the animal were fired into the air.
Once they were able to approach, officers discovered that “unfortunately, the individual was deceased.”
California Environmental Services officers and an El Dorado County trapper were then dispatched to find the cougar. The feline was in a tree, almost 100 meters from where Taylen’s body was found, and was shot.
Not counting Saturday’s tragedy, California authorities have recorded 22 people attacked by cougars since 1986, and three deaths, the last dating back to 2004.
A “specially protected” species in California since 1990, the cougar can measure up to 170 cm long and weigh up to 75 kg.
