If you're the kind of person who thinks they'd do anything for their dog, you'll probably relate to this wild viral video of a teenager shoving a large bear to protect her dogs.
In a video posted online Monday, a mama bear is seen walking along a brick wall, followed by two cubs. Four dogs start barking and growling, and they run at the bears. As they become more aggressive and the cubs flee, the adult bear swipes at the dogs.
Suddenly, 17-year-old Hailey Morinico sprints into the frame toward the bear, shoves it off the wall, and scoops up her puppy and bolts as the other dogs run away.
The video, which her cousin Brenda Lopez Rincon posted on TikTok and Instagram, has gone viral, with many people commenting about how stunned they were by Morinico's bravery.
Lopez Rincon told BuzzFeed News that she saw the video for the first time when her aunt sent it to their group chat.
"I felt a mixture of shock and a little proud of her because of how brave she is," she said. "We immediately told her to NEVER do that again."
Lopez Rincon described her cousin, who lives in Bradbury, California, as a shy and sweet person who "normally wouldn't hurt a fly" — which is why the video was so shocking to her.
"She loves those dogs very much!" Lopez Rincon added.
In a follow-up video that Lopez Rincon posted on TikTok, Morinico explained that she lives in the mountains and bears appearing at people's houses is "really normal," especially in the summer.
Morinico said she heard her dogs barking, which was not unusual.
"I go to tell them to stop and when I go over there to see what they're barking at, I'm like, That's a funny-looking dog," she joked.
She said the bear was picking up one of her smaller dogs by the time she realized what was happening.
"I go over to the bear, I look it in the eyes, and the first thing I think to do is push it. Push a bear. Push an apex predator," she said, adding that she didn't shove it too hard, but just enough so that it lost its balance.
The only injury Morinico sustained was a scraped knee and a sprained finger.
Lopez Rincon said the family has been a little overwhelmed with all the attention from the video, but at the end of the day, "we are all just proud we have our own Wonder Woman."