Gympie dog attack victim Tracy Mills speaks on horror attack

Salvation Army volunteer and mum Tracy Mills has opened up on how she landed in the midst of a nightmare in which she feared she would lose her hand, or even her life. *WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGES

After finishing up volunteering for the day with the Salvation Army on Friday, Tracy Mills packed off to meet a Facebook seller about some ceramic wares.

Instead, she landed in the midst of a nightmare where she feared she would lose her hand, or even her life.

Mrs Mills was the third of four victims of a terrifying spate of dog attacks in Gympie which left three in hospital and only ended after a several hours-long hunt across the city by police and the council’s rangers.

Speaking from her unit Monday, with her ravaged hand in a sling and her own support dog “Trixie” by her side, the 59-year-old resident opened up on her part in the terrifying ordeal which reportedly started at a popular walking trail by the Mary River.

It was there the dogs attacked their first victim, who was jogging along the River to Rail Trail near Kidd Bridge when the pair – two bull-mastiff cross and mixed breeds about 1m tall each, one tan, one black – struck.

Salvation Army volunteer and mum Tracy Mills has opened up on how she landed in the midst of a nightmare in which she feared she would lose her hand or, even her own life, at Gympie on Friday, January 31, 2025.

The jogger was bitten on the back, Mrs Mills said.

He was the only one of the four which did not require an ambulance on scene, according to Queensland Ambulance Service’s records.

The dogs’ next victim was about 100m away across the Old Bruce Highway, at Park Lane, about 11am.

There they attacked a man in his 30s when he opened the front door to his home.

He suffered a bite to his arm, and called paramedics.

It was shortly before 1pm when Mrs Mills parked her car on nearby Gladstone St, not far from the house she was planning to visit.

She walked across the road and, coming to the footpath, “a brown dog and a black dog was either side of me”.

“They started growling and barking at me,” Mrs Mills said.

The brown dog bit her on the hand so badly she “didn’t think I was going to get it back”.

She started to panic and as she started “screaming” for help “the black dog bit me” on the rear of her jeans.

The brown dog then “grabbed me by the hand”.

“My whole hand was in its mouth,” she said.

“I’m just screaming and yelling ‘help me, help me, get the dogs off me’.”

The man she had arrived to meet started yelling at the dogs from his yard to help.

“I don’t even know how I got my hand back,” she said.

“I thought I lost my hand. I didn’t think I was going to get it back.”

When the dogs let her go “I just ran”, sprinting past the homeowner and shouting at him to get inside and close the doors behind him.

When the dogs let her go “I just ran”, sprinting past the homeowner and shouting at him to get inside and close the doors behind him.

“I didn’t know what my injuries were until I got inside,” she said.

Mrs Mills finally was able to stop and look down at her injuries to see she “was bleeding all over (the) floor”.

She called an ambulance, and was then taken to Gympie Hospital.

As she was waiting, the dogs then attacked another woman at Bligh St not far from where she was bunkered down.

There a woman in her 60s was bitten on the arm.

“The only reason she got away was because a man came out with a pitchfork,” she said.

Mrs Mills said her wound required seven stitches to close, and she was given a tetanus shot.

Terrifyingly, their last victim was “not far away from another lady with a baby in a pram”.

“I’d hate to think what could have happened,” she said.

Mrs Mills said she became aware of the council’s rangers and police trying to catch the dogs in the wake of her attack.

They were finally corralled by 3.30pm, and both had been destroyed by 4.30pm.

Mrs Mills said her wound required seven stitches to close, and she was given a tetanus shot.

Fortunately there was no tendon damage.

A council spokeswoman said investigations into the attacks were ongoing as of Wednesday, and authorities had spoken with the victims and the dogs’ owners.

She urged anyone with any information which may assist the council to please contact them.

Penalties under the Animal Management (Cats and Dogs) Act can stretch up to six months’ jail or maximum fines of $48,000.

Another victim was bitten on the arm by one of the dogs before they were finally caught and euthanised.

Mrs Mills is now calling for the council’s rangers to have more support to ensure nothing like this happens again.

“I’m terrified,” she said.

“I think the council takes too long to act on dogs that are out.

“We have a big area … and they’ve only got four rangers.

“It’s scary to think it took the police and rangers all day to catch them.

“I can’t even fathom what it would’ve been like for a little kid to be attacked, because they just would have gone straight for the neck.”

She herself was so traumatised she was no longer even “game enough to walk up to my letterbox and check my mail”.

“It’s not just the physical – it’s the emotional too,” she said.

“You hear a dog bark and just go into panic mode.”

Mrs Mills was grateful she did not have “Trixie” with her for company when she was attacked.

She was mortified to think about how bad it could have been.

“One of the police officers said to me ‘you’re lucky they didn’t get you on the ground because they could have killed you’,” she said.

Originally published as Gympie dog attack victim Tracy Mills speaks on horror attack