Woman, 60, left bleeding badly after being attacked as husband took pics
Lucky not to lose an eye in three-minute attack, said doctors
Eight-year-old girl also attacked by 'agitated' cheetahs
Park manager said the deadly animals 'thought it was play time' and weren't 'being vicious'
Forced to the ground and with blood pouring from her head, this British holidaymaker had a miraculous escape after being attacked by supposedly tame cheetahs.
Violet D'Mello was visiting a wildlife park with her husband Archie during a trip to South Africa for her 60th birthday.
But their day out went horrifically wrong when two cheetahs turned on her, knocking her to the ground and biting her legs and head in a horrifying attack.
Other tourists tried to scare the beasts off as park attendants desperately fought to get them away from the injured woman.
And her husband? He carried on taking photographs, saying he did not quite realise what was happening.
The attack took place at a wildlife park where tourists can pay £4.50 to pet cheetah brothers Mark and Monty, both hand-reared and said to be tame.
Inside the private Kragga Kamma game reserve near Port Elizabeth, Mrs D'Mello posed for a picture with a cheetah, stroking its head and describing it as 'a beautiful animal that felt so soft'.
However, things changed quickly when one of the beasts grabbed eight-year-old Camryn Malan, who was among other tourists in the enclosure, and began biting her leg.
Mrs D'Mello comforted the girl's seven-year-old brother, Calum, telling him not to run so he would not aggravate the animals but as she did so, the cheetahs turned on her.
The mother of two said: 'I never imagined it would attack me because I was an adult. But the next thing I knew I was on the floor and the cheetah was right on top of me.
'It started scratching me really badly and then I could feel the other one come up too and one of them got my neck in its mouth.
'I was just screaming and trying to get my hands up around my neck to protect myself, but I was being bitten all over my legs and down my side near my kidneys.
'People all around were screaming, and I had no idea how I would escape. Something inside me just said, "Don't move. Don't move at all. Don't react, just play dead".
'Eventually someone came and chased them off me and my husband picked me up off the floor.'
The housewife, from Aberdeen, was bleeding heavily from cuts to her legs, head and stomach, and needed stitches in hospital.
