Texas Man Nearly Killed by Pet Warthog Attack

Summary:

Boerne, TX – Austin Riley raised Waylon the warthog from birth on his family’s ranch after Waylon’s mother died during labor. “I just kinda became his parent, his dad, really,” Austin said. “Early on, I’d take him with me through the drive-through at Whataburger, and he’d sit in the front seat, happy as can be.” Waylon soon grew to be “two hundred fifty pounds of pure protein,” according to Austin. By then, Austin had moved him to a large pen a few hundred yards away from the family home. Austin described his relationship with Waylon as sometimes playful: “He loved being a little pain in the butt,” Riley recalled. “But in the end, we had an understanding, and he never showed one sign of aggression.”

Then, one day, without any warning, Waylon stabbed Austin with his razor-sharp, seven-inch tusks at least fifteen times. The attack had shredded Austin’s lower body and filled his boots with blood, and then left gaping holes in his torso and neck. Before Austin could fight back, Waylon had hooked his owner four more times in the upper left leg and genitals.

Instinctively, during the attack, Austin grabbed onto Waylon’s tusks, which sliced open his wrist. After three more gashes in his abdomen, Austin attempted to put Waylon in a headlock. But the animal jerked upward, plunging his tusk into Austin’s voice box, leaving a quarter-size hole in his neck. The blow knocked him onto his back, leaving his entire body exposed to the rampaging boar. “At that point, I just knew I couldn’t let him hit my head or get on top of me,” Austin said. “That’s what I kept thinking.”

Lying on his back and bleeding out, Austin might have looked dead to Waylon. The warthog relented, momentarily. Austin then was able to swing his body over the fence and escape the warthog’s pen. Austin was then able to make a phone call to his dad. From there, he was taken to the hospital. By the time Austin reached University Hospital in San Antonio, thirty minutes away from the ranch, he’d lost nearly half his blood; any more, and he would’ve died, according to the doctors. Waylon’s tusks came within millimeters of severing multiple arteries. It would take doctors ten surgeries to keep Austin alive.

The day after the attack, Austin’s parents asked a family friend to execute Waylon. After the killing, Waylon’s head was cut off and sent to a lab so he could be tested for rabies. The results came back negative.

Action take by Born Free USA:

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