Sports - Canyon Bear

We spent the Sunday of Father’s Day in Salt Lake City, Utah. My wife treated me to an afternoon at a newly opened Cabela’s store just south of the city very close to where we were spending the night. What a treat that was.

The next morning, we where headed east across the mountains toward Colorado. To get there, we first had to choose a way through the mountains. We, purely by chance, chose to drive through American Fork Canyon. It started off being a beautiful ride along a narrow two lane highway shadowed on one side by a mountain stream almost the same width as the highway. Both sides of the road where encased by shear cliffs rising over a thousand feet above our heads. The colors and scenery where spectacular.

Less than a half hour into the canyon, we came upon a visitor’s center at which the road was blocked by Ranger cars and a young man in what looked like a volunteer’s uniform holding a stop sign. There where a couple of state police cars also in the area and about a dozen cars in the parking lot of the visitor’s center.

My wife got out of our car and walked up to the young man with the sign to ask what was going on. When she asked him, his reply was “haven’t you been watching the news?” Turns out that we had not been watching any news on TV that morning and didn’t have any idea what he was referring to. He went on to tell her that an eleven year old boy had been dragged from his tent just before mid-night the previous evening screaming to his mother and step father that some one or some thing was dragging him while he was still in his sleeping bag.

By the time the two adults got out of their beds to see what was going on, the boy had been dragged out of sight. The step father then ran almost a mile to find the camp ground attendant who immediately called for assistance and a search for the boy was begun. Shortly thereafter, he was found about 400 yards from where his tent was. He had been dragged off by a black bear. The bear killed and partly consumed the boy’s body.

A hunt for the bear was launched and the hunters had shot and wounded the bear close to where we had been stopped just about the time that we had arrived there. We waited for over an hour until the rangers told everyone there that the road would be closed until the bear was killed and bought in. It took another couple of hours for that to happen. By noon that same day, it was over. The bear had been killed and was later autopsied to confirm that it was in fact the bear that had killed the boy. There is only one way to confirm such an event. That is to open the bear’s stomach to see what it had last eaten. I don’t think I have to say any more.

For the next few days, all of the newspapers in Utah and the surrounding states carried the story and the big question was why had the bear attacked the boy. I listened to all sorts of stuff coming from people of all walks and interests some of whom can’t spell “wilderness”, but somehow became instant experts because the event took place within a thousand miles of their home. Was there food in the boy’s tent or in the campsite? Was it a rogue bear? Was it this or was it that? Why this or why that?

It was then revealed that what was thought to be the same bear had in fact pestered some people in the same campsite only the night before the attack and the authorities where immediately blamed for doing nothing about it, as if the bear just sat down in the parking lot waiting for them to come along and shake their finger in it’s face and say “go away you bad black bear”.

Bears don’t attack without a reason! In fact, bears are not very social animals and usually don’t like to hang around in the same area where humans are to be found. Seems to them, we stink! Something attracted the animal to the boy’s tent. A parental denial of food being out in the open somewhere, in the tent or near by, just doesn’t sit well and is usually the preferred position taken to protect the reputation of the smelly humans. At this particularly time of year, spring, natural food sources are in abundance. Have you ever known an 11 year old boy to go on a camping trip with out at least one candy bar in his pocket? That’s all it takes.

Never the less, the bear, doing only what comes naturally, looking for something to eat, resulted in a tragic death of a young boy, and of itself. Tragic?---- Without a doubt. Natural?----Totally!

I mourn the death of the young man and the agony and emotional devastation the family must be going through. To know and to see that your child was attacked, killed and partly consumed by a wild animal is, as a parent, beyond my ability to envision and comprehend. At the same time, as an outdoorsman, I understand and accept what happened.

Events such as this are part of the risk we all take once we step into the wilderness. Caution and care need….must….be exercised. Be careful. Enjoy what nature offers us, but, be careful! See you outdoors!