‘It’s on my head.’ Pregnant woman attacked by squirrel in Tacoma shares story

A 34-year-old pregnant woman who was randomly attacked by a squirrel at Browns Point last week said she was putting her 5-year-old daughter in her car when she felt something run up her back and onto her head.

“I jumped back from the car, and I realized, ‘Oh my God, it’s a squirrel,’” Federal Way resident Alysha K. told the News Tribune Wednesday morning. Alysha asked to not print her full last name for privacy reasons. “I tried to, kind of, shoo it. At that point it’s on my head, so I don’t want to get it to attack me.”

As reported by The News Tribune on Monday, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife “lethally removed” five squirrels in the Browns Point area with a firearm last week after it was found they were “exhibiting behavior indicating they had become habituated to people,” likely a result of them being fed by humans.

Alysha posted on Tacoma’s Reddit thread about her encounter with an aggressive squirrel on March 18. At the time she was on a field trip with her daughter’s preschool class at the fire station, she said Wednesday. Alysha said her daughter was in the car, and she closed the car door so the squirrel didn’t jump onto her.

“As I’m trying to shoo it, it jumps onto my arm, and then it bites down on my hand and clamps and holds it. And then it’s like, wrapped around my arm, gripping me, like it’s not going to let go,” Alysha said. “I’m pretty freaked out. I don’t want to hit it and have its teeth, like, rip into me. It was in there. I was kind of shaking it around and yelling at it. And eventually it jumped down, after like a minute, and then I kicked it in the face, because it looked like it was going to run back at me.”

Alysha said she kicked the squirrel three times square in the face before it finally turned away.

“It looked kind of dazed. And then it turned and ran into the nearby bush. My hand is like, gushing blood,” she said. “My poor daughter is so freaked out. I had to get her out of the car. Luckily, we were at the fire station, because I go right in and, these poor kids, I know I scared some of them dripping blood everywhere.”

Alysha said her injuries were cleaned and bandaged at the fire station. She later went to Tacoma General Hospital because she was six months pregnant and had concerns she might have rabies or another infection. A week later, Alysha said she’s healed up fine, “but it was a pretty scary situation.”

“I had my back turned, I didn’t even know the squirrel] was there. I didn’t have any food on me, nothing. It was totally unprovoked,” Alysha said. “I am a little on edge because squirrels are everywhere. You can’t walk outside without seeing five or six squirrels. I am glad I contacted Wildlife … [because] they told me they had captured a few of them, and they didn’t exhibit any signs of rabies.”

The Department of Fish and Wildlife told The News Tribune on Monday that only bats are known to carry the rabies virus in Washington, not squirrels.

Alysha said she was told by Department of Fish and Wildlife staff that squirrels tend to be more naturally aggressive this time of year because they’re breeding.

“And then someone in the neighborhood has been feeding them, so it messes up their fear of people,” she said. “I’m glad that [the Department of Fish and Wildlife were out there and captured them. It’s sad that that had to happen – when people mess with wildlife, and then they have to be put down. But they attacked me, a pregnant woman, and they could have attacked my daughter. And I wasn’t feeding them, I wasn’t doing anything. There was nothing I could have done to prevent it, so it’s pretty scary, you know. They have very sharp teeth and claws.”