War Photographer Stacy Pearsall Mauled By Dog

 

CHARLESTON, SC (December 19, 2008) – Photojournalist Stacy Pearsall, a veteran Air Force combat photographer who is still healing from wounds suffered in two bomb attacks in Iraq, was mauled by a dog yesterday while she was jogging in her neighborhood.

"I'm actually more sore today than when it happened," Pearsall, 28, told News Photographer magazine today. She was treated for the dog bites yesterday at Trident Medical Center and released after doctors determined the animal was up-to-date on its rabies vaccination.

The dog's owner voluntarily turned the animal, a chow mix with white fluffy fur and a curled tail, over to police, said Pearsall's husband Andy Dunaway, who is also an Air Force combat photographer and is also a veteran of the war in Iraq.

Pearsall said she covered her face and head with her arms when the dog lunged at her in the pre-dawn darkness, and the animal bit her repeatedly on the left arm and chest after knocking her to her knees. The photographer's face and neck escaped harm thanks to her quick reaction. "I think he was going for my throat," she told a newspaper reporter in Charleston.

The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals euthanized the dog after the owner told police she no longer wanted the animal after it attacked Pearsall. The dog reportedly weighed more than 100 pounds.

Police said the dog's owner told them the animal got loose the night before and didn't return, apparently spending the night in the woods behind the owner's home. It attacked Pearsall when she was running in the Brick Hope Plantation neighborhood.

To help her recover from her war injuries, suffered in both 2003 and 2007 in Iraq when improvised explosive devices went off during attacks on U.S. troops, Pearsall was just beginning to jog on the advice of her Air Force doctors. She recently retired from the Air Force because of the injuries and has been adjusting to civilian life after being a combat photographer for many years, becoming active in the Charleston Center for Photography where she is the director, and mounting an upcoming photo exhibit at Charleston's Halsey Gallery.

Pearsall was awarded the Bronze Star for her actions when she helped recover wounded soldiers during an ambush in Iraq, and she's been twice named the Military Combat Photographer of the Year.

 

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