Mountain Lion vs. Man With Chainsaw

It’s like the best scene filmed for the best action movie that never existed: While camping with his wife and two toddlers in Wyoming, a Colorado man fought off an attacking mountain lion with a chainsaw. I’m going to say it again, just because: with a chainsaw.

Dustin Britton, a 32-year-old mechanic and ex-Marine from Windsor, Colo., was cutting firewood near his campsite in the Shoshone National Forest west of Cody when he saw a 100-pound mountain lion staring at him from behind some bushes. It pounced, and Britton immediately defended himself with the chainsaw.

“It batted me three or four times with its front paws and as quick as I hit it with that saw it just turned away,” he said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press. “You would think if you hit an animal with a chain saw it would dig right in. I might as well have hit it with a hockey stick.”

The chainsaw left a six-inch gash on the cougar, and Britton took a puncture wound to the forearm. The mountain lion retreated, but was later killed after it attacked a dog wildlife officials were using to track the lion down. Upon examination, researchers determined that the cougar was sick and possibly starving, which might explain its uncommon level of aggression.

Not that it mattered. Welcome to the Ultimate Badass Club, Dustin—other members include Chuck Norris, Conan the Barbarian, this guy, this guy, and me (I once drank three cubes of Natty Lite, fashioned a raft from the cans, and sailed to discovered a new Northwest Passage). Membership is good for free beers at any bar in the country—or at least, it should be.

—Ted Alvarez

Man says he used chainsaw to fight starving lion (AP)

Thanks to Fred

Image Credit: B Mully