In February 2009, Charla Nash was viciously mauled by Travis the Chimp, leaving her clinging to life and in need of a full face transplant.
MediaNews Group / Boston Herald via Getty ImagesCharla Nash ’s new human face , post - surgery .
On Feb. 16 , 2009 , Charla Nash visit the home of her longtime Quaker , Sandra Herold , like she ’d done many times before . unluckily , the visit was anything but normal .
Sandra and her husband , Jerome Herold , had adopted a untried chimpanzee named Travis over a decade earlier . Although he had grown up in the nursing home alongside man from the time he was only three day old and was a darling appendage of the community , he had been having fits of erratic deportment for several years .
MediaNews Group/Boston Herald via Getty ImagesCharla Nash’s new face, post-surgery.
Tragically , the Pan troglodytes — who had habilitate himself , done task around the business firm , and kept Sandra company after her husband ’s fade — viciously attacked Charla Nash that morning , leave behind her permanently disfigured .
Charla Nash And Sandra Herold’s Longtime Friendship
Sandra Herold had recently suffered a pair of tragedies . In September 2000 , the Herolds ’ only child , Suzan , died after her car clash with a tree along an empty Virginia highway .
Luckily , New York Magazinereported , Suzan ’s baby girl was unscathed — but Sandra Herold spiraled into depression and struggled to uphold a relationship with her grandchildren .
The second tragedy get along in April 2005 , when Herold ’s married man died of tum malignant neoplastic disease after a weeks - long stay in the hospital . The sudden loss not only place her into a hard depressive disorder — but their pet chimp , Travis , as well .
Public DomainCharla Nash and Travis the Chimp, years before the attack when he was still a baby.
“ We are both lost without him and miss him in a heartfelt way . Travis still wait for him especially at supper clip , because at that sentence they both had a glass of wine with their supper , ” Herold indite in a letter to a chimpanzee sanctuary owner in Florida , nearly a twelvemonth after Jerry ’s death .
“ I live alone with Travis , we eat and log Z’s together but I am worried that if something happens to me as all of a sudden as my hubby what would materialize to Travis , therefore I have to judge to do something before that pass . ”
Throughout this metre period , Sandra Herold ’s isolation and unfortunate circumstances in Charla Nash ’s life had stimulate the two Quaker to drift aside .
Sandra Herold/Contributed Photo/Connecticut PostSandra Herold and Travis the Chimp in 2002, when Travis was 10-years-old.
Public DomainCharla Nash and Travis the Chimp , years before the attack when he was still a infant .
Nash and her then-12 - class - honest-to-god daughter struggle to find lasting housing and stay in a homeless tax shelter for more than a year at one point . Nash was scraping by on rum jobs , doing yard work , and clean buck carrel .
But Nash and Herold reconnected in brief after Jerry ’s demise , and what ’s more , Herold offer Nash and her girl a rent - free loft apartment that had belonged to her late daughter . She also gave Nash a job deal towing expeditiousness and bookkeeping .
Charla Nash also took guardianship of Herold ’s lawn and looked in on Travis , who had by this time become morbidly corpulent , spending most of his sentence snack , watch TV , play on the computer , and roaming the home which had become a good deal of unworn wearing apparel stuffed into pliant bags and bins .
matter were clearly seedy in the Herold home , but Nash and Herold ’s friendly relationship seemed to be a small beacon light of light .
Travis The Chimp’s Savage Assault On Charla Nash
One February weekend in 2009 , Sandra Herold and Charla Nash embark on a rare picnic , going to the Mohegan Sun Casino in Montville , Connecticut . Herold took her friend to the salon before they left — just in causa , she joke , two eligible bachelors happened to seem .
But when they return on February 16 , Herold come home to a extremely agitatedTravis . While she was clean his room , he took her keys from the kitchen counter , unlocked the door , and went out into the yard .
For the rest of the day , he render no sake in the thing that he typically enjoyed . Concerned , Herold put a Xanax in his good afternoon tea .
Sandra Herold / Contributed Photo / Connecticut PostSandra Herold and Travis the Chimp in 2002 , when Travis was 10 - year - old .
Here , the accounts split up — Nash maintained that Herold call and asked for her help coaxing Travis back into the family . Herold , however , has tell that Nash offered her help .
In either case , Charla Nash arrived at the Herold home around 3:40 p.m. Travis was in the front railway yard . To try and tempt him back into the sign of the zodiac , Nash showed him his favorite miniature , a Tickle - Me - Elmo doll .
Something in Travis snapped then . He knuckle - carry over to Nash , stood on his two legs , and throw her into the side of her automobile , then to the reason . He continued to ravage the fair sex as she lay on the ground bleeding .
Herold began hysterically tick Travis over the head with a shovel , but the Pan troglodytes would n’t stop . Not knowing what else to do , she ran into her house , grabbed a butcher knife , and stabbed him in the back . Still , he did n’t discontinue . She stabbed him doubly more .
Travis support up , depend his owner directly in the face , and then keep on his assault on Nash .
Frantically , Herold dialed 911 . “ He ’s killing my booster ! ” she screamed . “ He pull her aside ! Hurry up ! Hurry up ! Please ! ”
Nearly incomprehensible with panic , she tell the despatch officeholder , “ He — he ripped her face off … He ’s eating her ! ”
Charla Nash’s Lifetime Of Recovery
When police arrived , they institute Travis stalking the area , covered in blood . The military officer fired several rounds into him , and Travis , haemorrhage , fled into the house . A trail of blood line watch over his path through the kitchen and bedchamber , into his room where he died apprehend his bedpost .
Bits of Nash ’s body littered the M — flesh , fingers , and near half her dead body ’s blood . Travis had pull off her lid , nose , jaw , lips , and a heavy portion of her scalp .
As the ship’s officer approached what was sure to be her lifeless eubstance , she reached out for his leg . Somehow , Charla Nash was still live .
Three days after the attack , in critical condition , she was fly from Stamford to the Cleveland Clinic — where she would undergo 15 months of intervention .
Nine months after the attack , on Charla Nash ’s 56th natal day , she revealed her nerve live on Oprah Winfrey ’s show in what is now recognized as one of television ’s most extraordinary moments .
In the years since , she has undergo several rehabilitative surgery , including a face transplant .
“ I ’ve never been a quitter , ” she say to Oprah forward of the transplant . “ unluckily , there ’s not a whole lot I can do … It ’s very hard to live . Not even live — half - unrecorded . ”
Perhaps the saving state of grace in Charla Nash ’s account — if there is to be one — is that she does n’t commemorate the onset , over a decennary after .
“ I ’m order that it could stay out of sight for yr , and it could possibly hit me and get me nightmares and such , ” she toldTODAY . “ In the case that it does , I can get to out for psychological help , but knock on wood , I do n’t have any nightmares or remembrance . ”
Nash , now in her late LX , spends her time listen to audiobooks and medicine , but she is still blind from the fire . She may not have lost her biography , but the cleaning lady she was is all but blend in — she even bear another person ’s grimace entirely .
Still , she has remained incontrovertible about her convalescence and hop that her surgeries could help soldiers who confront alike disfigurements in the future .
“ Do n’t think about the past and what has materialize , ” she tender as advice . “ retrieve about what you ’re go to be , blend forth , and what you want to do next . Never give up . ”
After reading about Charla Nash ’s miraculous survival , learn about shuddery , actual - biography cannibal attacks . Then , learn about the moon curser in Colorado whofought off a mountain lionwith his bare hands .
