Ex-footy star saves woman from savage attack after she was ‘pushed and pinned down by man’ while on trail walk
- Arana Taumata rushed to the aid of a woman
- The woman had been pushed over and pinned to the ground
- The police are looking for the attacker
Ex-footy star Arana Taumata has revealed how he saved a young woman in distress in Brisbane’s Mount Coot-Tha.
Taumata, 35, who played for Penrith, Canterbury and North Queensland, was in action during a lunch round on Friday afternoon when he saw a woman in her 30s lying on the ground.
He rushed to the woman’s aid to find out what had happened.
“She was lying on the floor, just dazed. And I was like, ‘S***, are you okay?’ I thought she slipped,” Taumata said.
“She said, ‘No, someone pushed me, someone had me on the ground, someone had me on the ground.’
Arana Taumata has revealed how he saved a woman from a brutal attack
The woman, in her 30s, was confronted by a man dressed in black, who knocked her over and held her down.
‘Now I’m in hunting mode. Where is this dog? Where is he?!’ Taumata said in a video he recorded of himself while still on the road.
Reflecting on the incident, Taumata told 7NEWS that the alleged perpetrator was nowhere to be found.
‘She said the man ran towards me, which I thought was quite strange because I would have seen him. He might have gone into the bush, I thought,” Taumata said.
‘For me it was just instinct. You’re going to help someone when they’re on the ground.’
Fellow hikers shared their shock at Friday afternoon’s incident.
“I think it would be absolutely horrifying; it would be quite frightening and shocking,” one person told 7NEWS.
Another said: ‘You should be able to walk through these areas and feel comfortable and not threatened.’
Taumata enjoyed a short-lived NRL career with Canterbury, Penrith and the Cowboys
A Queensland Police spokesperson said no one had been arrested and an investigation was ongoing. The woman suffered minor injuries.
Authorities are not linking the attack to reports of a man trying to attack another woman at another Mount Coot-Tha track last month, at this stage.
Labor MP Jonty Bush issued an urgent message after the incident.
“We need to become more comfortable having uncomfortable conversations with people about their attitudes and approaches toward women,” Bush told 7NEWS.
