Marcy Sterlis tells Inside Edition she was terrified when nothing she was doing would get the coyote to leave her alone. Luckily, nearby boaters came to the rescue.
A woman taking a leisurely stroll on a Cape Cod beach suddenly found herself being stalked by a coyote. And if it weren’t for some nearby boaters who captured the whole incident on video, it could have ended very badly.
“The coyote seemed content that he had cornered me,” Marcy Sterlis, who was vacationing at the popular Massachusetts vacation spot, told Inside Edition. “Just kept coming at me, and I am screaming at that point.”
Sterlis said that she was terrified, because no matter how much she tried to shoo the animal away, “it wasn’t responding.”
During the 10-minute long ordeal, Sterlis’s boyfriend called her to see how she was enjoying her walk on the beach.
“I was like, ‘I need you to look up online what to do about a coyote,’” Sterlis said.
Luckily, the boaters just off shore pulled as close as they could to the beach. Sterlis waded to them and was pulled on board.
“It’s great to see your faces again. I am so thankful for your help. It was a very dire situation. I am extremely grateful for you coming to my rescue. Thank you,” Sterlis told the boaters via video chat recorded by Inside Edition.
“Not a problem. We’re just happy that you’re OK,” one of them responded.
Experts say you should never turn your back on a coyote and run. Also, don’t let them intimidate you — threaten them with loud noises.
“Everything you hear about, what you’re supposed to do when you encounter a wild animal, I was doing. I had run out of options,” Sterlis said.
Last summer in the same area, a coyote bit a beachgoer and killed a dog. Wildlife experts believe it was because people were feeding the coyotes and they became too comfortable around humans.
