In the wee hours on a recent morning, Dawn Marcia Wilson took her dog, Shadow, out for a stroll at a park near her San Jose home. By the time the sun rose, the 100-pound husky mix was dead and the retired software engineer was in the emergency room after trying to save her beloved pet.

Wilson, 66, and Shadow were attacked by a pair of pit bulls Thursday in what Wilson described as a helpless, half-hour ordeal that finally ended when the dogs scampered off. Friday, San Jose animal control officials canvassed the neighborhood for help finding the pit bulls — the third dog attack on a person in San Jose in the last four months.

“They took my dog down immediately, chewing on him and trying to kill it,” Wilson recalled Thursday night. “Had him by the throat. I was in the thick of it.”

Wilson, as she had done hundreds of times during the last few years, rode her adult tricycle with Shadow to the nearby Cataldi Park, a 39-acre, family-friendly swath of greenery next to Interstate 680 at the Milpitas border, just after midnight.

“I have taken him to the park and never had a speck of problems like this, not even a hint of it,” she said.

But this time, for whatever reason, a large tan-colored pit bull and a big black dog, described as a mixed-breed pit bull, appeared from the shadows in an isolated part of the park. The dogs went right for Shadow, who was off leash about 30 feet from Wilson.

Shadow, 12 or 13 years old, had grown feeble in the years since Wilson adopted her as a young “fluff ball.”

Now, Shadow was in the attacking dogs’ clutches, and Wilson joined the fight. There was no one around to hear her cries for help, and she says she lost her phone in the initial scuffle.

For the next 20 to 30 minutes, she tried to pull one of the dogs off Shadow while another one attacked from the other side. They bit Shadow repeatedly and, whenever Wilson joined the scuffle, the canines bit her, too.

Finally, the attacking dogs ran off, leaving their bloodied prey behind.

“They figured he was dead, I guess,” she said.

Wilson finally found her cellphone and called her spouse. The two women took the canine to a 24-hour veterinarian. The diagnosis was dire, and the staff told the couple Shadow should be euthanized immediately.

Wilson — a former pit bull owner — then went to the emergency room and was stitched up for cuts across her face. Although she has cuts and bruises all over, she is most worried now about infection.

Jon Cicirelli, deputy director of San Jose Animal Care and Services, which is investigating, said they found blood and hair at the scene the next morning and spent Thursday and Friday interviewing dog owners and residents in the area, and plan to continue this weekend. But because the dog and Wilson were rushed to the hospital before reporting the attack, their trail on the pit bulls was cold.

“But if the dogs live in the neighborhood, two big dogs like that, people are going to recognize,” Cicirelli said. Indeed, residents in the area reported that they had seen the dogs hanging around the area before.

If the dogs are found, they would be put down unless they have owners. Even then, the owners would have to make a case that they are safe enough to be kept under “severely restricted” care, Cicirelli said. Owners of vicious dogs can also be subject to fines.

Both Wilson and Cicirelli believe the dogs were only after Shadow — and that they only attacked a human because she had intervened in the melee.

“The dogs weren’t out to get her, I don’t think,” Cicirelli said. “Then she got badly hurt trying to save her dog.”

The attack comes after a 78-year-old man also was stitched up in the ER after dogs attacked him in the Blossom Hill area of San Jose in January. A month before, a 41-year-old woman was mauled by pit bulls in southeast San Jose.

Anyone who spots the pit bulls from Thursday’s attack is asked to call animal control at 408-794-PAWS. If the dogs are seen acting aggressively, call 911.

Contact Mike Rosenberg at 408-920-5705.