Finding Wilderness

Archive for the ‘Attack Reports - Bears’ Category

Pepper spray is an excellent bear deterrent but it has it’s weaknesses:

• You have at most six seconds of spray
• You can never be 100% sure that you have pressure in your can (if you test it, you lose one or two of those precious few seconds).
• It’s questionable in the wind
• It’s problematic and probably not effective from inside of a tent.

Large bore handguns are a great back-up to pepper spray and great from inside a tent but firearms have their downsides as well.  They’re

• heavy
• expensive
• Not legal in many areas
• kill or gravely injure the bear unnecessarily

I am experimenting with a third option – the handheld marine flare.  The version made by Ikaros is ideal.   Unlike a typical road flare, it is ignited by simply pulling a string.  With a properly designed holster, this can be operated with one hand.  As far as I know the marine flare is untested on bears, but it is a good bet that the brightness, sound, and the heat would be an effective, last stand deterrent against an aggressive bear.

Ikaros Marine Flare as a bear deterrent

Advantages of marine flares:

• light weight
• can be ignited with one hand
• can be used in close quarters
• burns for 60 seconds
• relatively inexpensive (usually less than $20 at marine supply stores).

Disadvantages of marine flares:

• forest fire risk
• hazardous materials risk
• risk of suffocation and burns in tents

Video demonstrating the ignition of an Ikaros marine flare:

A bear that had been trained to ice skate as part of a Russian circus has attacked and killed a circus director, while wearing skates.  These types of attacks are sad, for the humans as well as the bears (this one was shot and killed).  And they are not particularly rare, given the relatively small number of people who have trained animals.  We regularly see videos and photos of people who have trained large carnivores, and consider them safe.  They are not.

Not having anything else handy, this women threw her I-Phone at a bear that was following her.  The phone distracted the bear and it stopped following her.  Ruined her I-Phone though.

This report today in which two British Columbia hunters were attacked by a grizzly while in their tent is instructive for several reasons.

Lesson One: This is is another example of the limitations of a rifle during an attack, especially inside a tent.  The hunter had to struggle somewhat to get the bear in a position so that he could shoot it without injuring his friend:

“I closed the bolt on the gun, thinking I have a bullet in and pushed the bear up because I didn’t want to shoot my friend”

Unfortunately, in the dark and the excitement, he only thought he had chambered a round in his rifle.  The gun when click when he pulled the trigger.  Which leads to

Lesson two:  Keep your gun loaded.  (In Canada this may be illegal, I understand.)

Lesson Three:  Resistance can work.  In this case the the bear broke off its attack before the men were able to fire a  rifle.  From a Canadian Press report:

“Then she just hit the tent and levelled both of us and basically started thrashing and biting and she was on my buddy more than she was on me but she was tossing me around in the process of mauling him.”

Hebert and Scown did their best to yell at the grizzly and push it away. Then, just as quickly as it had attacked, the bear ran off.

“We were basically fighting against it and then all of a sudden it just stopped and it just left,” he said.

Lesson Four:  It shows that predatory attacks by bears are not always spur of the moment things.  These hunters followed the bears tracks in the snow and discovered that it had been following them for more than a day.

Lesson Five:  A bite on the arm is better than a bite on the face or the neck, and is survivable:

“I kind of always wondered what it felt like to be bit,” Scown said. “Luckily, it didn’t get a full upper and lower jaw-bite on me, but it didn’t feel as bad as I thought it was going to feel.

Additional note: The female grizzly was not particularly large judging by the photo of the paw print in the linked article.   The photo shows that  the width of bears paw was about twice the length of a cigarette lighter.

This is another reason why it is good to carry pepper spray, and to draw your pepper spray before your gun.

As reported in the Powell Tribune on Tuesday, October 13, 2009

While being mauled by a grizzly bear on Saturday morning, a hunter also was shot by a fellow hunter who was attempting to fend off the bear, according to a report from the Montana Park County Sheriff’s office.

The incident happened in the Coulter Pass area near Cooke City, Mont.

The Livingston, Mont. dispatch center was notified of the mauling at approximately 10:26 a.m. Saturday, the report said.

The hunter was transported to a local hospital for treatment.

“Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks is currently the lead investigation agency, and the (Montana) Park County Sheriff’s office is assisting with this investigation,” said the report.

Here’s an update from the Great Falls Tribute.  They report that the hunter hit is friend in the arm with the first round, and later killed the bear.

There have been several bear attacks recently in the same area near Anchorage.  In one recent case, college cross-country runner Auston Ellis was able to avoid injury by staying just ahead of the bear before it gave up the chase.  This is the only case I remember where someone has been chased by a grizzly without getting bitten or at least pawed.  One thing that may have made the difference in Auston’s case was his speed — he was able to stay just inches ahead of the bear initially — and after running just a few yards he turned a corner sharper than the heavier bear could manage, which had to stop.  Apparently that was enough to dissipate the sow’s “bite the intruder” reflex and she took off with her cubs after a short stare down through the bushes with Auston.  Here is the core part of Auston’s account, as reported in The News Tribune.

“I’ve never heard of a story where anyone who has run from a bear that bad things haven’t happened,” said Ellis, 21, who grew up in Wyoming before spending his high school years in Valdez.

But, as he fairly points out, most of the people who advise dropping and playing dead for a grizzly bear have never had a bear chomping the air inches from their butt.

“I couldn’t do it,” Ellis said. “It was one of those instinct things.

“I took off and sprinted for about 20 yards or so.”

As usually happens, the bear gave chase.

It “was maybe 2 feet behind me the whole way,” Ellis said. “I was 99 percent sure I was going to get mauled, and I was about 97 percent sure I was dead.”

Running, he decided, wasn’t going to work. A bear will invariably beat a man in a sprint.

“I banked left into the woods,” Ellis said.

He was going fast enough that the bear, being far bigger and thus less nimble, couldn’t make the corner.

“I banked quick enough that she had to come to a stop,” Ellis said.

The move gained him precious seconds in the chase. He looked for a tree to climb to safety now.

He couldn’t find one. He dove into a thick tangle of alder.

“The bear circled back,” Ellis said, “and got with about 3 feet of my face. We had this stare down over the bush. I didn’t breathe or blink or anything.”

After a short time, the sow moved off with her cubs.  The stare down is another unusual feature of this bear encounter.  Stare down’s are common with cougars, but unusual with bears.  I think this incident tends to support my idea that a foot forward, but semi-passive defensive stance would be better than playing dead.  (See the page “How to fight bears,” on this site).  Who knows what this bear was thinking during the stare down but it clearly knew that Auston wasn’t dead.  It was probably trying to figure out what Auston was, and gauging whether he was a threat.

I was shocked and saddened to hear today about the death of hiker T. J. Langley.  The Seattle Times said he was on a solo hike near Luahna Peak, above Boulder Pass in the Glacier Peak Wilderness.  He was found at the bottom of a glacier, apparently having slipped.  T. J. was a likable fellow with a taste for wilderness not unlike my own.  I’m sure he will be missed.

I interviewed T. J. in an Idaho Falls, Idaho hospital 10 years ago after he had been attacked by a grizzly bear in Yellowstone National Park.  I was interviewing him for my magazine, BEARS and Other Top Predators.  (The account of his attack is in Vol.1, Issue 3).  I have photos in my files of his lacerated and stapled head and of his eye socket sewn closed to protect the eye from infection.  He thought the eye was safe, but I never heard for sure.

Recently I had been thinking about looking him up now that I had moved from Idaho to Seattle.  In the years since I interviewed him I had postulated a method for defending bear attacks.  His experience was particularly informative because he switched tactics during the encounter from playing dead to fighting back.  I wanted to revisit a few details with him.  I should have done it sooner.

In the hospital he told me that thereafter he would always hike with a companion when in bear country.  I guess black bear country with a slight chance of meeting a grizzly didn’t count.  Or more likely the solace of solo trips was too compelling.  A few years ago I hiked solo to the very end of Napeequa Valley.  We would have hiked over much of the same territory.  Over little Giant Pass, down into Napeequa Valley (a Shangri La if ever there was one).  But he went up Boulder Pass and then along the high ridges along the West end of the valley.  I went to the end of the valley and out to the North, off trail, over a narrow pass.  From my bivi I could see across the valley to Luahna Peak, two miles directly south.  I know where his heart was when he died.  It’s a good place.

Map of area of Lauhna Peak and upper end of Nepeequa Valley.

Nepeequa Valley from Little Giant Pass

This is the view of Nepeequa Valley from Little Giant Pass. T.J. would have descended into the valley, then probably went up Boulder Pass, which climbs out of the valley about halfway up the picture. Then he would have followed the high ridges, first to Clark Mountain, and then to Lauhna Mountain, which can be seen along the left side of the photo. I followed the valley all the way to its end, then climbed out to the north. I bivied on the lowest spot that can be seen on the ridges in the far background.

Clark Mountain (sharp summit on left) Lauhna Mountain (in center)

When I snapped this shot from the valley I remember thinking how rugged those mountains were.  I thought  they might be a nice adventure  someday.  When I first posted this I wasn’t sure whether this was showing Clark or Lauhna Mountain.  T.J.’s friend, one in the party that found his body, left a comment that Clark is on the left and Lauhna is on the right, and that T.J. fell on the other side of the mountain.

Waterfall in Nepeequa Valley

Looking down Nepeequa Valley from the upper end.

Cirque at the very end of Nepeequa Valley. Lauhna Mountain would be off to the left.