
A Washington woman survived a brutal cougar attack thanks to the help of her friends, who fought off the animal with sticks and rocks, and pinned it down until help arrived.
On Feb. 7, Keri Bergere, 60, and four of her friends set out on their bicycles. 19 miles into their ride on the Tokul Creek trail, near Snoqualmie, Keri was attacked by a cougar.
“The cougars ran out from the brush on the right side of the road and they kind of ran between the two groups of us and one went up into the woods and the other one changed his mind and decided to tackle Keri,” said Annie Bilotta, one of the five women, all in their 50s and 60s, on the bike ride.
“From the time we saw the cougars to the time it took Keri off her bike was about three seconds,” Bilotta said. “We didn’t have a chance to face off with them to scare them away or anything.”
After tackling Bergere off her bicycle, the cougar held her head in its jaws, refusing to let go even as the other four women attacked it with sticks and rocks.
“I immediately tried to choke the cougar, which was like trying to choke a rock. Then, Erica and Tisch come over with sticks and a rock and we’re hand-to-hand combat battling this thing,” recalled Bilotta.
After about 15 minutes of struggle, the cougar loosened its grip, allowing Bergere to escape. The other women quickly pinned the animal under one of the bicycles, holding it there until help arrived.
“Keri’s just laying there by herself and we kept saying, ‘Are you doing OK?’ and she would just give us a bloody thumbs up that she was doing OK,” Tisch Williams, one of the cyclists, said.
After about 30 minutes a Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife arrived on the scene and shot the cougar.
Bergere survived with permanent nerve damage and trauma to her face and jaw. She says she’s just happy to be alive.
“I know for a fact I would be dead if they didn’t come back in, I would just be gone. That cougar had me and there’s no doubt in my mind,” she said.
A Washington State woman is crediting her team of women cyclists for saving her life after she was attacked by a cougar along the Tokul Creek trail.https://t.co/anVs1WFEQX
— KOMO News (@komonews) March 17, 2024
In the last 100 years, the state of Washington has only suffered 22 dangerous cougar attacks. Two of the attacks were deadly, and 20 resulted in injuries. This attack was highly atypical. Cougars are generally cautious of humans, and will normally stalk their prey before deciding to attack.
The cougar was a young male. Experts say that cougars at that age are sometimes still figuring out how to hunt and which animals to target. Cyclists are one of the more common targets for confused cougars, as the speed and shape mimic natural prey such as deer.
Cyclists who’d like to avoid a similar situation should carry bear spray, and upon seeing a cougar, stop moving, make noise and attempt to look larger, which will scare away the cougar in the vast majority of cases.