What a great shot..and coyote hunter..
Coyote shot after Eastside attacks
By Peyton Whitely
Seattle Times Eastside bureau
ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES
Sgt. Kim Chandler of the Department of Fish and Wildlife shows a local television crew how he drew his gun and shot a coyote along an Eastgate trail on Friday, three days after a coyote attacked two Eastside children.
Three days after a coyote attacked two Eastside children, a state Fish and Wildlife agent shot and killed a coyote along an Eastgate trail Friday.
The agent, Sgt. Kim Chandler, said the animal was probably among those threatening people and wildlife in the area.
On Tuesday, a 11/2-year-old boy was bitten on the ear while he was playing under the supervision of his parents at Eastgate Elementary School, and later a 4-year-old boy was bitten on his buttocks while playing outside his Eastgate home. That led officials to set traps for the coyotes and to a heightened effort to look for them.
Chandler said he saw a TV newscast Thursday evening that included a video made by a man with a cellphone video camera. The film showed the man's own encounter with a coyote.
Chandler immediately recognized the area because he had just been there Thursday morning scouting possible places for coyote traps.
The trail is at a dead end of Southeast 37th Street, a few hundred feet south of Interstate 90, leading from a motel parking lot east of 150th Avenue Southeast.
Chandler returned to the area early Friday morning. He used a device known as a predator call to draw the animal out. As he was walking back down the trail, he saw a coyote.
The animal stopped on the trail, he said. "He absolutely saw me. He had no fear of me whatsoever."
The animal approached him, Chandler said, and he drew his .40-caliber Glock semiautomatic pistol and finally decided to fire.
"I tried for a shoulder. I missed," he said.
Then he fired again, and missed a second time, explaining that he was trying to prevent hitting the animal in the head, since the brain is used to do rabies tests.
The animal then nearly disappeared but then "peeked out from behind a tree," and Chandler, from about 25 feet away, tried one last time this time successfully. "This was just blind dumb luck that I was here," he said.
The department later announced that no rabies tests could be done on the animal because there was insufficient brain tissue remaining for the procedure, despite Chandler's efforts. Wildlife officials also are continuing with their efforts to trap and control other coyotes, Chandler said, and it's expected that there are several of the predators in the area.
Chandler noted that the animals eat cats and pet food and warned residents against providing any food for the animals, but he also added that the terrain is ideal for coyotes and other predators.