Dog bites a young man in Granada province's Guadix: 'If it had been a child or an elderly person, it would have killed them'

Dog attack

The Guardia Civil is trying to clarify whether or not the animal has an owner, after it attacked the man on Sunday 3 May who said "I kept calm so that it would stop"

Laura Velasco

Granada

A young man in Guadix in Granada province had to make split-second decisions that would mean the difference between minor injury, serious injury or ... worse when a dog, which appeared to be stray, attacked him on Sunday 3 May.

José knew that he would not come out unscathed, so he had to minimise the damage; the dog had already latched onto his leg. He kept his cool and in his opinion, that worked in his favour.

José Pérez, a resident of Guadix, had gone for a run at around 8.30am on Sunday 3 May. He was in the outskirts of the town, on the turn-off to the Camino del Humilladero, before passing the train tracks, when he spotted a "big black dog", one of those "scary dogs that you see in the movies". He does not know the breed.

The dog attacked him, biting José's leg. "I knew that if he smelled my fear he would bite me more, so I kept calm. The animal eventually walked away but had left José's leg bleeding and in pain. "He let go and I kept running," José says. José passed two people and warned them to turn around. "They wanted to take me to the hospital when they saw the blood gushing out of my leg, it was so much," he says, but in the end he took himself to hospital.

At the hospital he was given two stitches and antibiotics and the doctor who treated him said that the consequences could have been much worse. After he left hospital José went straight to report the incident to the Guardia Civil, who are trying to find out whether or not the animal has an owner.

José Pérez hopes the animal won't attack anyone else: "If it had been a child or an old person, it would have kill them". The young man, who runs a restaurant, says that if the dog does have an owner, he does not understand how it could have been loose: "That dog can only go out tied and/or muzzled", he concludes.