A dark-skinned man with a nose ring attempted to abduct a 10-year-old girl on her way to school Friday morning.

The incident occurred about 7:20 a.m. as the fifth-grader was walking to Sweeney Elementary School on Airport Road, Santa Fe police Sgt. Louis Carlos said.

The girl told police she first noticed the man get out of a sport-utility vehicle — possibly dark blue or black — that was parked facing east on Airport Road as she crossed the road, he said.

When she arrived at the other side of Airport Road, the man began to approach her and she felt threatened, so she began running toward the school, Carlos said. The man ran after her for about 100 yards, then gave up. Carlos did not know if the man said anything to the girl or not, but said he never touched her.

The girl was "distraught" and crying uncontrollably when she arrived at the school, Carlos said.

The girl's teacher, Jennie Herrera, said the 10-year-old did everything she should to escape from the man.

"She screamed as loud as she could, and she ran as fast she could to a safe adult," and did not respond to her would-be abductor, Herrera said. "She was screaming at the top of her lungs."

According to the teacher, the girl might have been saved by the mother of another student who was driving by Airport and South Meadows roads at the time.

Herrera, who spent the day attending to the girl, said the parent, who apparently saw the man chasing the girl, opened the car door, grabbed her and pulled her inside. She said the girl complied because she recognized a child in the vehicle.

Santa Fe police could not confirm that account, saying that the girl told them she ran all the way to the school.

Herrera said numerous teachers, parents and students saw the girl running from the man and heard her screams. "There were lots of people around."

A counselor at Sweeney who was driving to school on South Meadows Road reported seeing the man walking away from the school, Carlos said.

The girl described the man as a dark-skinned, about 5-feet-7-inches tall, 170 to 180 pounds and 29 to 30 years old. He had a nose ring and was wearing a black jacket with a printed T-shirt underneath, blue jeans and a black beenie.

Herrera said teachers were summoned by Principal Matt Martinez before classes began and were told of the abduction attempt.

Martinez and school district spokeswoman Erica Landry said a note describing the situation was sent home with the students and that parents would be notified by phone calls Friday night through the district's computerized messaging system, the School Messenger.

Landry said the note focused on the Police Department's account of the incident and asked anyone with information about it to come forward in an effort to track down the would-be abductor.

Herrera also said some parents were called during the day, and that no child was allowed to walk home after school.

The teacher said the girl, who was pretty shaken up, was first taken by police to the Santa Fe Rape Crisis and Trauma Center and then returned to the school to have as normal a day as possible. Her mother was notified in the morning, and then picked her up after school.

Herrera said she told her fifth-graders not to bother or fuss over the girl so that she could have as much privacy as possible. She said the child stayed close to her all day, the two even eating lunch together.

The incident marks the second time in less than week that a man has tried to abduct a child from Santa Fe-area streets. But the description of the suspect in Friday's incident didn't appear to match the one from Monday in the Eldorado area, authorities said.

"At this point, it doesn't appear to be the same person," said Santa Fe County Undersheriff Robert Garcia.

The earlier incident involved an 11-year-old girl in the Eldorado area who fought off a man in his 20s who grabbed her as she walked home from a school bus stop. That man was described as between 20 and 30 years old and was wearing a black hooded sweat shirt, an orange beenie and gray sweat pants. He was driving a black, four-door, late-model sedan, the victim told police.

Contact Jason Auslander at 986-3076 or :jauslander@sfnewmexican.com. Contact Dennis Carroll at 986-3091 or dcarroll@sfnewmexican.com.