“It was startling,” Burgess said. “I saw the dominant bull moving toward them and I tried to yell at them to get away.”

But the people didn’t hear him.

The bull first slowly approached them before lowering its head and charging, Burgess said. Its large antlers connected with a woman’s arm and she started to bleed. One of the men took off his shirt and wrapped it around her arm.

“There was a lot of blood on her arm and on her face,” Burgess said.

Burgess picked up the group of people in his truck and drove them about a half-mile to their car, he said.

“I was so upset,” Burgess told the Post-Dispatch on Monday. “I just want people to know what can happen when you get so close.”

As Burgess rounded the park, he said he saw two more groups of people walking near the elk and told them to move back.

Local hospitals could not confirm if they got a patient reporting an elk injury Sunday.

The incident followed an earlier goring on Sept. 30, said Tom Ott, assistant director of the St. Louis County Department of Parks and Recreation.