Harrowing incident was happened in the elevator and the security camera footage has captured the moment that a woman was savagely mauled by a pit bull in the elevator of an apartment complex in Cúcuta, Colombia.
In the minute-long video, the 25-year-old woman is already on the floor being attacked as she crawls backwards into the elevator while struggling with the large animal.
She attempts to push the dog away as it continues to bite her in the neck, legs, and arms, eventually managing to reach up with her bloodied hand to press the elevator button.
When the elevator doors open the dog then latches onto the woman again, dragging her out backward leaving a pool of blood on the floor.
According to local media, the distressing incident occurred last Thursday after the victim arrived home at the fifth-floor apartment she shares with three other people.
The dog, which belongs to another resident, was in her room when it began to attack her as she was tying her shoelaces.
“Her reaction was to crawl to the door and go out into the hallway, hoping a neighbor would help her,” a judicial source told the Spanish-language outlet La Opinion.
“When the animal jumped on her, the only thing she thought was that if she stayed on the fifth floor, no one was going to rescue her.”
According to the newspaper, residents were panicked by the sounds of the woman’s screams echoing through the residential complex as nobody knew what was happening — until the elevator doors opened and they realized a pit bull was attacking someone.
The dog stopped attacking the woman after the elevator reached the first floor.
The victim was helped by guards at the complex and a relative, who rushed her to Erasmo Meoz University Hospital with serious injuries, particularly to her fingers.
“She has fractures in two fingers of her right hand, a phalanx on her left,” a police spokesperson said.
“She is still hospitalized and pending transfer to a clinic for a medical procedure.”
According to the outlet Pulzo, the pit bull should have been wearing a muzzle under the relevant law, which states that “potentially dangerous dogs” must be leashed and muzzled in common areas of residential complexes.
Some residents told La Opinion the dog had never shown aggression to anyone, but that the owners always took him out for walks wearing a muzzle.
The four-year-old pit bull has been seized by local authorities, who say they will hold him for 10 days for behavioral analysis.
Pit bulls, which are banned in many countries, are by far the most dangerous dog breed and are responsible for the vast majority of deaths.
In the United States, pit bulls make up only 6 percent of the population but were responsible for 68 percent of dog attacks and 52 per cent of dog-related deaths between 1982 and 2014, according to research compiled by Animals 24-7 editor Merritt Clifton.
According to DogsBite.org, in the 16-year period of 2005 through 2020, canines killed 568 Americans, with pit bulls contributing to 67 per cent, or 380 of those deaths.
Pit bulls are a restricted dog breed in Australia and subject to varying ownership rules by state and territory. Importation of pit bulls into Australia was banned in 2011.
