Cows nearly killed me, says ex-soldier
Victim, 55, left with 7 broken ribs by stamps of startled herd
a FoRMER army officer suffered life-changing injuries and feared she was going to die after being trampled by cows.
Janicke Tvedt, 55, came across the 30-strong herd on a walk with her partner david Hood, 57, and their labrador, Goose.
after knocking the mother of two down and pinning her against a fence, the animals stamped on her, causing her stomach to swell ‘like a watermelon’.
She managed to escape when her military training kicked in and she went into ‘survival mode’. The couple hid in a tree, where Miss Tvedt slipped in and out of consciousness while Mr Hood tried to raise the alarm.
Miss Tvedt was airlifted to hospital and was treated for seven broken ribs. Part of her colon was removed.
Recalling the incident near Masham in North Yorkshire last July, she said: ‘I was convinced I was going to die. I was trying to get in contact with my son because as
‘Pawing their hooves on the ground’
far as I was concerned, that was it, I wasn’t going to see anyone again. Had there been a child or an elderly person there, they would not have survived – that’s how serious the attack was.’
The ordeal started when the couple came face to face with a cow and two calves. She said: ‘The cow was obviously startled by us, so she bolted directly at the dog, who was on a lead.
‘She kicked the dog, and the dog ended up rolling on the ground. ‘Then loads more cows came to her defence. They pinned us against the hedge. I had the dog very tightly on the lead, which is what I thought I was supposed to do. I stood there really still with my partner, not trying to be aggressive toward the cows, and after about ten minutes of sniffing us, I thought they were going to leave.’ But one of the cows knocked Miss Tvedt to the ground and she was repeatedly stamped on. one cow ‘kept raising itself up on its hind legs and then stamping its front legs actually down on me’, she said, adding: ‘It trampled me at least four times on my abdomen and chest, and then once of my face, but I had my arm across my face. ‘I’ve still got a mark on my cheek where I think it crushed my glasses into my face. Then one of them knocked another over, and it fell and landed on my legs, and then did a complete body roll over my body. So I was crushed by the weight of it – these were absolutely massive rearing cattle, with horns. I was terrified. apparently, I was shouting at the cows. But they were snorting, mooing and grunting. They were pawing their hooves on the ground.’
When the cows dispersed the couple climbed a tree where Miss Tvedt, who works as a life coach, passed out three times in 20 minutes. She said her training as an officer in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers helped her escape. She is rebuilding her fitness after having had a colostomy bag fitted and says she now has to accept ‘what I can and can’t do’.
The couple, who had followed an instruction on a farmer’s gatepost to keep their dog on a lead, advised others in a similar situation to unleash their pet.
‘When you’re under attack you’re supposed to let the dog off the lead and kick the dog away,’ she said. ‘It’s the dog that’s the issue. They see it as a predator.’