From the original article, this morning, I was under the impression the attack had taken place outside, however the news today said that it happened indoors. No-one could have predicted it would happen and my heart goes out to all of the childs family.

I totally agree with Amies statement, it is time the govenment made some effort to ban these fireworks now, I'm not holding my breath waiting though.

Echo That ..

My heart goes out to the family of the little girl

What an appalling thing to have happened, my heart goes out to her family. She was a gorgeous little girl who died a most dreadful death

This sentance stood out for me...

It barked its head off all day long. It was a menace," she said.

Why did it bark all day? Was it on it's own for long periods of time? Was it a menace because it was untrained and unsocialized and bored out of it's mind? It is a strange time of morning too, could the dog have mistaken the kid for an intruder?

Doesn't change the dreadful thing that happened but kinda makes me wonder a bit

I have just said this in a previous post of mine. That sentence stuck out to me too. For someone to think the dog was a 'menace' must indicate that the dog was not properly restrained? untrained? unsocialised? etc

A few of the articles state that the owner of the dog, this lil girls uncle, was not present at the time of the attack. OMG how must he feel.

Just heard this on the news. Very, very sad. Something went badly wrong there, and I think we should let it be a reminder that our furry friends have big sharp teeth, and therefore need watching.

I just wonder how many owners of badly-bred, inadequately-socialised labradors/irish terriers/pekingese/bearded collies etc... are shaking their heads in wonder that anybody would keep a "pit-bull" type dog when they're so dangerous.

it is awful.

we had a thread like this a while ago and everyone got a bit upset over it.

i don't really want to say anything about it apart from the fact that its very sad.

i'd like to add that, up until july of this year i swore blind that my irish setter jazzie would never ever go to bite anyone or indeed actually bite anyone - that changed in july when she was very poorly at while we were at the vet she did actually go to bite me - she was sore, and fed up of being pulled about by the vets etc. it doesn't make it right but it just proves that i was very wrong!!

i also say that a dog is a dog no matter how domesticated - you will NEVER be able to take away the wild and defensive side of them!

People will be quick to say that the dog 'was a menace'. Come on. We saw these kinda statements when the press had a field day with the Rottie attacks. The dog may have been a menace but we don't have a full account of what happened. We may never know what happened but we should know better than to take what the press say as gospel.

Yes, barking all day long, that sure is a sign of something not being right. We have an uneducated and misguided fellow on the other side of our valley, his little dog barks all day, we know why, but it's considered non PC to go tell someone their doing it wrong, and his case he wouldn't take heed anyway In St. Helens crossing the road to tell someone their dog barks all day would likely get you at least a black eye and maybe worse.

It's still a sad day for humans and dogs and not helping to bring us closer together.

P.S.
In case anyone thinks I'm discriminating against St. Helens, I'm not, same result almost anywhere in English big towns and cities.

I saw this earlier on the news. My initial reaction was of course, how awful for this poor child and her family. My second reaction was, oh no, not again

Many people have said that they don't see the breed in these attacks as being relevant. I think most of us are interested though, and if the press had just said "a dog" had attacked and killed a child, we would all be asking what was the breed.

May be the child was not alone with the dog, but according to reports the dog was know to be liable to attack so should not have been in the room with the child, alone or not. For the next few months all Staffie crosses will be under suspicion and it is just because an irresponsible owner allowed this tragedy to happen.
I know everything one reads is not always true but the police and the local council are saying this dog has been reported before because of an unprovoked attack on a dog, and if it were my dog and my child no way would they be in the same room, it is asking for trouble and is not fair on the dog or the child.