SEE IT: Hawk Hunts, Kills Rat In Morningside Park Trash Can

MORNINGSIDE HEIGHTS, NY — Ceridwen Morris was taking a typical long stroll around Morningside Park on Wednesday afternoon, walking in the shadow of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, when she suddenly sensed that she was not alone.

"I was like, wait," she told Patch. "I turn to my right, and there’s just this hawk."

The fearsome feathered bird, later identified by observers as a red-tailed hawk, was peering intently into a trash can right outside the park's entrance at 112th Street. Morris, a doula, took out her phone and began recording.

"That kind of energy of the hawk just, like, being a hawk four feet from me, even though I wasn’t looking around — I was not going to miss that," she said.

Seconds later, the hawk abruptly dove into the big green Parks Department trash can, prompting an audible "Oh s--t" from another woman who had joined Morris to gawk at the raptor.

After a brief ruffling of feathers, all was silent for about 25 seconds, Morris's video shows. Then, with a flap of its wings, the hawk emerges again on the rim of the receptacle: clutching, in its left talon, "a huge fat rat — dead," in Morris's words.

"Like, newly dead," she clarified.

In those brief moments, the hawk had apparently killed the rodent with its talons, as is typical for the species. Morris saw no blood, but the rat looked lifeless. Morris and her fellow onlooker were stunned.

"I just had a moment of being impressed by the sort of hawkishness of the hawk," she said. "There was such intensity in that bird that after he got the rat out — I must’ve taken four steps back."

Evidently, others share Morris's awe: her video of the encounter had racked up nearly a quarter of a million views by Friday afternoon.

More dead rat coverage: Eric Adams Promised Us Hope Through Boozy Rat Death Traps