A leisurely vacation for a 63-year-old man and his wife in Zambia took a terrifying turn as a hippo attacked the couple's canoe. The animal pulled cunder the water and flung him into the air with force, like a rag doll. However,despite sustaining severe injuries from the attack, he fortunately managed to survive the harrowing experience.
Duning an interview with BCC, Cherry said they were on the Kafue River, when he found himself trapped between a hippo's jaws. Describing the event to the outlet, he told the impact of the hippo's attack. He said when it first hit the canoe, there was a massive crash, similar to a car crash.
"I remember surfacing, realising my shoulder was quite badly injured and I realised I'd dislocated it from the outset and the consequences were that I couldn't actually swim,” he said. "The instructions were to swim to safety but I couldn't swim so I was really a sitting duck, trying to swim with one arm which was never going to end well - and then it grabbed me," he further added.
Cherry recalled that when he saw blood over his abdomen during the attack, he kept thinking, that he don’t want to die, and thought, "That's not good.”
Roland Cherry's wife on hippo attack
Shirley, Roland Cherry’s wife, said recalling the incident that she saw him surface and thought he took a gulp, and then she saw him being thrown in the air.
"The hippo could have attacked any one of us and I can't help feeling if the hippo had... if it had been me, I wouldn't be here now, so I think Roland took one for the team,” she added.
Meanwhile, Cherry sustained a 10-inch wound on his stomach, along with a dislocated shoulder and a thigh wound, as per outlet. The staffs of the hospital where he received treatment consider his survival fortunate, emphasising that if his injuries would have been slightly more severe, he might not have survived.
Cherry expressed about his awareness that while navigating the river they they knew they were in the hippo's domain. He further mentioned his displeasure with the hippo's actions towards him, stating, "not very fond of what [one] did to me".
