By Tim Binnall
Residents of a California neighborhood are sounding the alarm about a strangely aggressive squirrel that has viciously attacked several people. According to a local media report, the weird case is currently unfolding in the community of San Rafael, where eye-catching flyers warning about the rowdy rodent began appearing earlier this week. "Attack squirrel beware," the notice screams atop a picture of an admittedly comical picture of one such critter. The flyer goes on to caution residents that "this is not a joke. More than five people have been attacked by a very mean squirrel over the past few days."
Lest one still think the warning is the work of a prankster, resident Joan Heblack recounted her harrowing encounter with the creature that now has San Rafael on edge. "It came out of nowhere," she recalled, "I didn't see him running up to me at all." Heblack was alerted to the presence of the pugnacious squirrel when it pounced on her leg. "I was like, 'Get it off me, get off me,'" she told a local TV station, "I didn't want to touch it." The unfortunate woman, who had merely been out for her morning walk, ultimately wound up needing medical treatment for the bite and claw wounds inflicted by the sinister critter.
Resident Isabel Campoy shared a similar story, explaining that she was recently attacked while out for a walk with her niece. The creature, she said, "tried to jump up to my face." While Campoy managed to thwart that initial maneuver, the animal would not relent and soon latched onto her arm, which was "completely overcome by squirrel." For reasons only the confrontational critter knows, it eventually was satiated in its attack and fled the scene with its victim badly bleeding and also needing medical attention from her run-in with the rodent. "It hurts to touch the skin," she lamented, but bravely declared, "I am putting my best power and mind in order to say I'll survive this."
While Heblack and Campoy undoubtedly hope that their experiences were of the once-in-a-lifetime variety, San Rafael wildlife expert Vanessa Potter indicated that such encounters with aggressive squirrels are "not unheard of." She suggested that the rodent, which is believed by residents to be a singular offender, was likely fed by humans when it was younger. "If they associate people with food, they're not afraid of them," Potter said, "they will look for food. If they don't get it, there can be frustrations." Weirdly, since word of the squirrel has spread beyond San Rafael, it would seem that there has been no sign of the menacing critter that continues to haunt those who ran afoul of it.