/ 19 December 2012

Eagle lifts baby off ground in incredible YouTube video

The incredible footage of a golden eagle attempting to snatch a baby was loaded onto YouTube and is predicted to go viral.
The incredible footage of a golden eagle attempting to snatch a baby was loaded onto YouTube and is predicted to go viral.

The video is the latest episode of animals behaving strangely in Canada.

Coming just a week after a monkey wearing a sheepskin coat was found wandering around an IKEA parking lot in Toronto, the video shows the massive eagle — with a roughly two-meter wing span, circling a public park.

The eagle then swoops down, lifts an unsuspecting toddler off the ground by her winter coat and carries her a few feet before dropping her on the grass.

After cursing in English, the French-speaking man filming the incident races over to comfort the bewildered child, who starts crying but does not appear to have been seriously hurt. 

"A golden eagle tries to snatch a baby in Montreal! What if he got away with it!?" reads a caption under the video, posted by MrNuclearCat.

The video had just 311 views early Wednesday but was making the rounds on Twitter.

"Destined to be huge!" one user wrote. 

"Craziest video I've seen in a long time," tweeted another.

The golden eagle is the largest bird of prey in North America, and can dive at its quarry at speeds of more than 241 kilometers per hour, according to the US National Geographic Society.

The eagle likely mistook the toddler for a rabbit, marmot or ground squirrel, its normal prey. – Sapa-AFP