A YOUNG woman was fighting for her life in hospital last night after being gored by a giant stag during a holiday in the Highlands.
The angry beast’s antlers pierced her throat and went through to her spinal column in the incident during the early hours of yesterday. It is feared that if the 30-year-old active and keen outdoors woman survives the horrific attack she may be paralysed.
Kate Stone, from Cambridge, was standing with a group of friends laughing and chatting outside the home of well-known Highland musician and guitar tutor Jim Hunter, 50, at Lochailort, near Fort William, when the massive stag burst out of the darkness.
It seemed to single out Ms Stone, who at 6ft-plus was the tallest of the group of six.
It lowered its head and impaled the young professional woman in the neck with its antlers.
After shaking its head to free itself, it vanished into the surrounding trees and moorland leaving Ms Stone lying on the ground bleeding.
At first in the darkness her four friends and Mr Hunter thought Ms Stone had only been knocked over, but they quickly realised the attack had been more serious.
An ambulance was called from Mallaig 15 miles away and the injured woman was taken to the Belford Hospital in Fort William.
Doctors there discovered her life-threatening injuries and she was flown by air ambulance for specialist treatment yesterday at the Southern General in Glasgow.
The group had earlier been at a ceilidh in the nearby Lochailort Inn where they met Mr Hunter who invited them back to his home. He was unavailable for comment yesterday.
The five friends were in a multi-national group of three men and four women on a three-day break at the local B&B of Falklands conflict veteran Gary Burton, 51, and his wife Kasia, 35.
Mr Burton, of Mo-Dhachaidh, said: “The first my wife and I knew about the attack was in the early hours when the four guests returned here.
“They were very shocked but they managed to hold it together. They were a mixture of Americans, English, Dutch, South African and one Scot, in their late 20s to early 30s.
“Glasgow-born Rozelle Kane who now lives and works in Oxford seemed a particular friend of Kate.
“Rozelle seems to have a medical background and I am told, was a particular help in treating Kate in the aftermath of the attack.
“Kate was due to go and visit her sister in Dundee today by car and then returning back south was going to collect Rozelle from the Glasgow area where she too was going to be visiting relatives and friends.
“I think the link between them all was meeting up at a spiritual event in Nevada some time ago.”
They had been spending the three days out walking in the hills and enjoying the scenery.
Mr Burton added: “I understand Kate is critical in the hospital intensive care unit.
“She was telling me she enjoyed the outdoors in the hills and camping on her own in remote places so any form of paralysis to such an active person will be a disaster.
“The incident is absolutely shocking and so unexpected. There are plenty of deer round here but you never hear of a stag attacking anyone.
“The force of the attack must have been ferocious. I went to the scene and found Kate’s mobile phone smashed into tiny bits.”