An 11-year-old boy is in hospital after suffering a horrific attack by a neighbour’s pit bull which tore off part of his scalp.

Kenny Allen, of Rock Hill, South Carolina, had gone to the neighbour’s home to borrow a blender on Wednesday evening so that he could make a milkshake.

As he approached the Ridgecrest Road property, at around 6.30pm, the dog broke free from where it was tied up in the backyard and leapt from behind some bushes.

It pounced at the boy, biting him repeatedly on the right hand and arm and viciously ripping off a chunk of flesh from the back of his head. 

From their home a few feet away Kenny’s father Kenneth said he could hear the boy’s pained screams for help.