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Comment by jncfhnb | Hacker News Reader

> I thought the best thing I could do is approach them in a friendly manner, so I put my head down, showing I was not threatening,

I don’t know if this is, or is not, the best thing to do but what stands out to me here is it seems to be their best guess. As in, they hadn’t been trained on what to do?

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As a non-expert who has basic fucking sense:

first mistake is to approach an animal you know is hostile.

Also that specific owner of the lip-biter should be in prison. If someone actively being bitten in the face can maneuver a door closed on the dog, then so can the owner.

The owner didn’t try hard enough to help. A person in a dire situation figured this out. The owner did not. The owner is not fit for owning this dog if their level of control is less than someone who’s in panic.

There is no way this person is not responsible for buying the dog and then not acting to prevent the attack.

> I don’t know if this is, or is not, the best thing to do but .. it seems to be their best guess. As in, they hadn’t been trained on what to do?

I've walked by very aggressive dogs w/o issue - while the people who followed me were charged. I had made some eye contact and otherwise didn't register them. The other folks were more respectful of the animal and their territory. Objectively, their approach has a better track record.

My take: The dogs had been wound up for 3 sec on my approach and 60 sec on theirs.

Risky dogs were common where I grew up, including ferals I knew and ran from every time (they were noisy, I had lead time). In my exp, there isn't a standard template. Reading the dog can help sometimes. Other dogs have fully unpredictable behavior. Known behaviors can change over time.

This is a good point. It's a occupational hazard that's been joked about for decades (as Royal Mail acknowledges). The article doesn't say what the postal service is doing to mitigate this.

Is there PPE a worker can use if they're delivering to a house with an animal? Should there be a requirement for mailboxes to be mounted at a certain height so workers don't have to bend over? Is anyone even looking into this?

Not saying it’s good or anything but RM used to provided a kind of peg for pushing mail through the letterbox, not sure if its still supplied. I believe has some sort of record of which addresses have suspect animals on the walk.

PPE feels like the wrong approach. Loose dog? No delivery.

What I've always been told is to not bow but kneel down to their level instead. Although I've always felt that puts me in a vulnerable position.

I tell people to do that with my dog and it works (he's not aggressive in any way, just a bit skittish with new people).

> Although I've always felt that puts me in a vulnerable position.

If you squat or kneel, you are more stable, facing forward, have your arms in a position where they can manipulate something in front of you (i.e. to defend yourself), and your legs as the forward-most part of your body. If you bow, your torso is off-center of your feet, your center of gravity stays high, your head and face are the most exposed part of your body, and your arms are angled to manipulate something below you.

If an attacking dog gets into a position where your arms can deflect it while bowing, your groin, legs and torso are already in trouble.

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