A spotted hyena
On Saturday, Aug. 30, Nicolas Hohls, 27, who lives at Strydgewon Farm in Harburg, KwaZulu-Natal, arrived at Cape Vidal Nature Reserve in St. Lucia, South Africa — which he'd been visiting since he was 6 years old — just before noon with his dad, Colin, ready for the celebrations to begin.
Hohls and some friends had been fishing in the day and had some food and a few beers that evening before going to bed tired, after the week's work, at around 1 a.m. local time.
Approximately half an hour later, he said two hyenas attacked him after one entered his tent through a 6-inch gap that he'd left unzipped for ventilation.
One of the two animals ended up with part of Hohl's head inside its mouth, with its jaws clamped around his cheek and skull, while the other clamped onto his left ankle.
"One went for my leg and the other for my face and head. I fought them off by ripping my face and ankle free, then attacking the eyes of one and forcing my hand down the throat of the other," Hohls tells PEOPLE of the attack.
"I had been asleep...when I realized what was happening, it was pure instinct. I knew I had to fight to survive," he adds, telling PEOPLE, "I reacted immediately. I ripped myself free and went straight for their weak points — the eyes and throat. It was all instinct and adrenaline."
Hohl's screams woke his dad, who was in the rooftop tent above him.
"My dad jumped into action immediately. He found me in a pool of blood in my tent, put me in the car, and drove me straight to Ballito hospital," he tells PEOPLE.
Insisting he'd zipped up his tent "the same way" he "had done many times before," Hohls says, "I've camped at Vidal before without problems. That night I left a small gap for ventilation. If the hyenas wanted to get in, they would have found a way regardless, and that's exactly what happened."
He said the "fight lasted about 60 seconds" and was "one minute of hell," in a piece he wrote to remember the incident, which he shared with PEOPLE via email.
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