PHOENIX (AP) – An Arizona woman who broke vertebrae and collapsed lungs after being mauled by a bison in Yellowstone National Park has said “yes” to her boyfriend’s request for hospitalization.
Chris Whitehill said he was planning to propose to Amber Harris during their holiday at the park this week, but after spending just one night there, an encounter with a buffalo upended those plans.
A couple from the Phoenix area went to the lodge for coffee on Monday and decided to take a field trip to Yellowstone Lake in Wyoming, Harris posted on Facebook the next day.
They waited for the other people and about 20 elk to leave the area before continuing. They also saw two buffaloes. They watched one “fall and roll on the ground, like a dog,” he wrote. “He stood up and walked, and ran towards us.”
The bison “hit its head and was flying,” Whitehill told KPNX-TV in Phoenix. “I think he did one or two backs in the air, and I was screaming and yelling trying to distract him. He landed on his back a lot.”
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Harris, 47, was airlifted to Idaho Regional Medical Center in Idaho Falls, Idaho, where he recovered from seven broken bones, a collapsed lung and bruises.
Whitehill “got down on one knee by my hospital bed,” Monday night, Harris wrote in a Facebook post that included a photo of the ring on her finger. “Without hesitation I said yes!”
Whitehill started a GoFundMe campaign for Harris’ medical bills. In an update posted Thursday, he said Harris doesn’t need surgery but has to wear a back brace to keep his back out of action.
The bison attack was the first in Yellowstone in more than a year, park officials said.
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