UMUAHIA— A disaster was reportedly averted at Umuohu Okpula, Ndume community, Ibeku in Umuahia North Local Government area of Abia State, when a vigilant grandmother prevented a four-day-old baby from being carried away by a hawk.

The grandmother, who gave her name as Adeline Emmanuel, explained that she was lying down, when she heard the loud flapping of bird’s wings.

According to her, she heard noise of a struggling object as the bird was trying to fly through the window, but fell down on the floor of the one-storey building, prompting her to shout at her daughter, mother of the baby, to shut the window.

She said: “I saw the hawk drop down where my four-day-old granddaughter was sleeping and was trying to carry the baby who was probably too heavy for it.

“It was then that I started shouting, asking my daughter to close the windows.

“My shouting and that of my daughter coupled with others, who were by then aware of what was happening, attracted the community youths.”

She said the youths were able to catch the hawk and break its legs and wings.

In her account, the mother of the four-day-old baby girl, Mrs. Joy Emmanuel, said she was outside when her mother-in-law’s shouting made her rush in, only to be confronted with the unusual sight.

According to her, it was only the grace of God that made her to survive the shock, as she had never seen such an incident in all her life.

She explained that they live upstairs in one of the apartments in the building, but “because the weather on that Sunday was unbearably hot, we decided to leave the windows open, which was how the hawk flew into the room and tried to carry my baby.”

For the landlord of the building, Mr. Aaron Ibeji, he has never seen or heard that a bird, no matter its size, tried to carry a baby.

He said the incident nearly shattered the peace of the community.

Ibeji, however, expressed happiness that the youths of the community were able to catch the bird. He said that they were waiting for the elders of the community to decide on what they are going to do with the bird.

Vanguardngr