All that Marcy Sterlis was hoping for was a nice, relaxing solo walk on the beach at Cape Cod. But what she endured was quite the opposite. While you probably don't expect to see wild coyotes at the beach, one happened to meet up with, and threaten, Marcy.
Marcy played it smart. For about 10 minutes, she tried to fend off the coyote with a stick. She also made loud noises, in hopes of scaring it away. But this coyote was relentless.
"My voice is still really hoarse from screaming so much this morning," she told Fox affiliate WFXT. "I was so scared." There was no way Marcy could have prepared for the encounter, but she did the best she could to avoid serious injury. In fact, that's why she brought the stick in the first place.
As she told news outlets, she knew that coyotes sometimes approached the beach area. So, as a safety precaution, the stick came with her. She didn't even think about what might happen if her stick failed to scare a coyote off the beach.
Luckily, Marcy wasn't technically alone. A group of boaters managed to catch her struggle, and one even took a harrowing video of what was happening. They decided that the best thing they could do was attempt a rescue.
At first glance, the boaters assumed that Marcy was just playing with her dog. But when they kept looking — and hearing Marcy's cries for help — they realized she was in danger.
"Everything you hear about what you're supposed to do when you encounter a wild animal I was doing," Marcy told Inside Edition. "I had run out of options."
Watch the video to see what Marcy was dealing with, and how she thanked her brave rescuers.
