Editorial: Man's best friend needs controlling

A dog attack on two women in Hawke's Bay should not have happened.

The dog attack on two women on Whirinaki Beach at the weekend is a horrific incident that simply should not have happened.

Yes, dogs are man's best friends and when you have a good dog, they make for fantastic companions.

But they need to be kept under control. We understand that sometimes accidents happen and dogs get out of a yard, but no one deserves to become a victim of a marauding pack of dogs.

What a traumatic experience for the two women, one of whom was simply enjoying a jog near Whirinaki Point, when a male staffordshire bull terrier, male mastiff cross and male rhodesian ridgeback cross attacked them.

We have published one of the photographs of the wounds the woman jogger suffered but did not publish others that were far too graphic. The other woman, believed to be in her early 60s, was transferred to Hutt Hospital for specialist surgery. A spokeswoman confirmed she was in a stable condition last night.

These two incidents happened within 45 minutes of each other and both women were picked up by St John Ambulance and taken to Hawke's Bay Hospital.

They could easily have been killed. The first woman was helped by the occupants of a passing car who scared off the dogs, while a little girl found the older woman badly injured.

One of the dogs has been handed over to Hastings District Council Animal Control and will be destroyed, while the council is still investigating what to do with the other two.

They will probably need to be put down as well.

It is awful that this needs to happen but it would be worse if they attacked again.