Boy (2) mauled by lioness at game farm. (3 November, 1998)

Johannesburg - A grandfather and a game ranger fought - and won - a desperate tug-of-war with a lioness which had grabbed a 2-year-old Germiston boy at a game farm near Bethlehem in the Free State.

The attack took place on Sunday during the family's last South African wildlife holiday - a treat for Tiaan Strydom and his brother and sister - before the family emigrate to Australia at the end of the month. Little Tiaan was watching two lions in an enclosure at Comorhi Game Farm when, without warning, a 6-month-old lioness lunged forward and knocked him off his feet. The lioness sank its teeth into the boy's hips and tried to pull him into the enclosure through a gap under the gate. Tiaan's grandfather, David Windell, who was video taping the family outing, threw down the camera and grabbed the boy by his arms to pull him away from the animal.

"The lioness had its whole mouth around Tiaan," said his mother Bernadette Strydom. "It could have picked any of the children, but it went for my baby, the smallest," she said. While Mr Windell was wrestling with the lioness, the boy's father, Francois, tried to tear open the fence because the gate was padlocked. A game ranger heard the screams, climbed over the fence, grabbed the lioness around the waist and pulled it away from the boy. The family had returned from a game drive and were watching the lions when an American hunter arrived with a dead buck on his bakkie. Mrs Strydom believes it was this that sparked the attack. Tiaan was admitted to hospital and underwent an emergency operation. He received 60 stitches to his calf and will need skin grafts.
Own correspondent.