A Texas couple had a frightening moment Saturday when a giraffe at Fossil Rim Wildlife Center plucked their 2-year-old daughter out of the mother’s hands.
Jason Toten was driving a pickup truck through the wildlife tour with his fiancée and children in the bed of the truck when a giraffe walked over, leaned into the back of the truck and grabbed daughter Paisley, as Facebook video from a visitor in another vehicle shows.
“I looked out the back window and I saw the giraffe…and then up she went,” Toten told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. “My heart stopped. It scared the hell out of me.”
Fortunately, after his fiancée said in a stern voice, “Hey,” the giraffe quickly dropped the toddler back into her mother’s hands.
“I guess it startled the giraffe,” Toten told the Star-Telegram. “She (Paisley) wasn’t even scared. As soon as her mom caught her, she went, ‘Oh.’”
With his daughter safely in the arms of mom, Toten quickly drove off.
He told the Star-Telegram that the incident was an accident, saying the giraffe was trying to grab a bag of food Paisley was holding but missed.
Visitors to Fossil Rim Wildlife Center, located 110 miles southwest of Dallas, are provided with food to feed some of the animals, explaining the behavior of the giraffe.
