Alaska Bear Mauling Recorded on Tape

Yahoo ^ | October 8, 2003 | Rachel D'Oro

[lambo]

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - The graphic sounds of a fatal bear attack were recorded, Alaska state troopers discovered Wednesday while reviewing a tape recovered near the bodies of a wildlife author and his girlfriend.

Trooper Chris Hill said Timothy Treadwell may have been wearing a wireless microphone likely activated when he was attacked by the brown bear at Katmai National Park and Preserve. The videotape has audio only; the screen remains blank for the three-minute recording.

"They're both screaming. She's telling him to play dead, then it changes to fighting back. He asks her to hit the bear," Hill said. "There's so much noise going on. I don't know what's him and what might be an animal."

The bodies of Treadwell, 46, and Amie Huguenard, 37, both of Malibu, Calif., were found near Kaflia Bay on Monday after an air taxi pilot arrived to pick them up. The pilot contacted the National Park Service and state troopers to report a brown bear was apparently sitting on top of human remains at the campsite.

After rangers arrived one of them shot and killed a large brown bear when the animal charged through the dense brush. Rangers and troopers later killed a smaller bear apparently stalking them.

An autopsy on the human remains confirmed Wednesday the couple were killed by bears.

Troopers recovered video and still photography equipment as well as three hours of video footage from the site, across Shelikof Strait from Kodiak Island.

Much of the footage is close-up shots of bears — for which Treadwell was well-known.

Some scenes show bears no more than a few feet from Treadwell, co-author of "Among Grizzlies: Living With Wild Bears in Alaska." Others show a more timid Huguenard leaning away as bears come close to her on the bank of a river.

[Calvin Locke]

They'll both be voting Democrat next election.

Nah, I doubt it. The "Better Red Davis than Dead" party didn't
quite work out for them.

And neither are they likely voters for the Green Party.
Communing with nature, it seems, has its drawbacks.

[weegee]

There is an interesting (and funny) Canadian documentary about a man who wanted to have a second encounter with a grizzly bear after he encountered one in the wild.

He spends much of the movie designing (and retooling) a suit of armor that will survive a grizzly mauling.

He has a dream . . . and it has six-inch claws.

Meet Troy James Hurtubise, a self-styled "close-quarter bear researcher," who's obsessed with going face-to-face with Canada's most deadly land mammal, the grizzly bear. Troy is the creator of what he hopes is a "grizzly-proof" suit of armour -- an extraordinary fusion of high-tech materials and homespun ingenuity -- and of his own hybrid mythology that is part Hollywood, part Canadian shield. His quest takes audiences into a world both compelling and disturbing, full of contradiction, humour and fantastical vision.

Join Troy as he tests his armour and courage, in stunts that are both hair-raising and hilarious. Journey with this modern-day Don Quixote and his band of men, as they travel from the donut shops and biker bars of North Bay to the mythic Rocky Mountains, for a date with destiny.

Directed by Peter Lynch and produced by Michael Allder, Project Grizzly explores the territory between documentary and drama, where the dividing line between fact and imagination is as thin as a knife edge. In this twisted nature film, it's man, not bears, who come under the closest scrutiny.

Robo-Bear in the Rockies... Clint Eastwood meets Jacques Cousteau... Project Grizzly is a film about overcoming insurmountable odds, leaving an imprint, creating your own legends.

So suit up -- and join the quest

THE SUIT

Name:
Ursus Mark VI

Development Time:
Seven years

Total Cost:
$150,000

Materials:
Fireproof rubber exterior (from Minnesota)
Titanium outer plates (from Hamilton, Ont.)
Suit joints made of chain mail (from France)
Tek plastic inner shell (from Japan)
Inner layer of air bags

Height:
2.18 metres (7 ft. 2 in.), with head-top camera attachment

Weight:
66.68 kilograms (147 lbs.)

Headpiece:
Two-chamber headpiece. Inner helmet: specially-modified Shoei motorcycle helmet. Outer chamber: aluminum/titanium alloy shell. Dimensions: approx. 60 centimetres (2 ft.) deep; 45 centimetres (1 ft. 6 in.) wide.

Cooling System:
Battery-powered twin-fan ventilation system draws cool air into helmet and vents warm air.

Radio System:
Voice-activited two-way radio.

Viewing System:
Helmet-mounted miniature camera with wide-angle viewscreen.

Black Box:
Voice-activated recording device located on the rear-right side of head piece, to record bear sounds or, in the event of a catastrophic failure of the Ursus Mark VI, last words.

Defensive System:
Trigger finger-activated "blaster can" on right arm, capable of spraying a 38 centimetre (15 in.) diameter cone of bear repellant for a distance of 4.6 metres (15 ft.), for a duration of 7 seconds.

Testing On Suit:
Truck: 18 collisions with a three-tonne truck travelling at 50 kilometres an hour (30 m.p.h)
Rifle: Shot at with 12 gauge shotgun, using "Sabot" slugs
Arrows: Armour-piercing arrows, fired from 45 kilogram (100 lb.) bow
Tree Trunk: Two collisions with a 136 kilgram (300 lb.) tree from a height of 9 metres (30 ft.)
Bikers: Assault by three bikers -- the largest, 2.05 metres (6 ft. 9 in.) tall, weighing 175 kilograms (385 lbs.). Biker armaments: splitting ax, planks, baseball bat.
Escarpment: Jumped off escarpment, falling over 15.25 metres (over 150 ft.).

Bite Bar:
Pressure-sensitive strip located on right arm, to measure the biting power of a grizzly.

[SevenDaysInMay]

NO FEMALE NEAR OR DURING MENSTRUATION SHOULD BE AROUND BEARS!

Even lil' blackies in the Smokies. Sick, injured, and starving are very dangerous.

I don't know what triggered this fatal attack, but people are bear food. Women remind bears of the fact.

This girlfriend lost her life joining this unwise pursuit of breath close videos.

Aside from their Malibu home town, what ever happened to common sense?

[capitan_refugio]

"Only took a warning shot.
My advise, Always carry."

True for Alaska.
True for South Central L.A.

[nmh]

"... I mean the "animals are equal" whackjobs.."

No problem here. Man is losing what little common sense he had to begin with. Hey, if they want to sues themselves as live bait for wild animals, ... cleans up the gene pool.

[Pelham]

The tiger spit him out, because the tiger is a meat-eater and didn't like the taste of fruit...

[SevenDaysInMay]

Bears usually eat humans abdomen first. That is why they think humans taste like sh!+, predigested food. Yum. The rest of skin, meat, bones, and polartec is often left to season under a pile of leaves and soil for a fortnight to slime. Enzyme rich, slimed human corpses taste even better to urus.

[StayoutdaBushesWay]

From the same review:
My hope is that when Treadwell finally accomplishes his real goal, the bears he lives among will not acquire a taste for human flesh as a result of his having forced the meal upon them.

[bootyist-monk]

These morons had been warned repeatedly by local officials that they were putting not only themselves, but other people at risk by getting close to the bears. Bears are naturally afraid of humans, and these two spent their time trying to condition them. While they flew back to Malibu, the bears, now used to human company, would threaten the locals rather than steer clear.

Not a pleasant way to go, but fitting.

[cherry]

no.....you play dead with a grizzly but you fight off a black bear....black bears along with cougars don't particularly want to actually fight...they will back off if they think you can harm them....that is just what I have learned from experts...I have no exp. with bear attacks...

[Calvin Locke]

Bears are naturally afraid of humans, and these two spent their time trying to condition them.

Oh, I see.

The Park Service at Yellowstone has to destroy bears that are no longer afraid of humans because of escalating food obtaining techniques.

So, these two tried to taint the bears trying to teach them tolerance and diversity, and make snacks of the locals in the process.

[IncPen]

Courtesy ping

[aruanan]

The movie "Bambi" really screwed up a lot of minds.

That's why Bambi needed to meet Godzilla.

[Treebeard]

And if anyone else doesn't understand it, three words: "bathe your cat" . My stitches come out tomorrow.

[marktwain]

Had I been there, I would have wanted one of the 12 gauges, a 9mm is just going to piss a brown/grizzly off

The park ranger who killed the "large agressive male grizzly" killed it with 11 shots from a 9mm, according to another story posted on FR. It dropped 12 feet from him. He got off 11 shots from the time the bear started charging until it was down and no longer a threat.

You can easily get off 11 aimed shots from a 9mm in 5 seconds. It is impossible to know the minimum number of shots that would have done the trick. When a bear is trying to kill you, you just keep on shooting until it is no longer a threat.

[palmer]

You're right. My experience with black bears is they are skittish and run away after a one second mental processing delay.

[Sabertooth]

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - The graphic sounds of a fatal bear attack were recorded, Alaska state troopers discovered Wednesday while reviewing a tape recovered near the bodies of a wildlife author and his girlfriend.

Trooper Chris Hill said Timothy Treadwell may have been wearing a wireless microphone likely activated when he was attacked by the brown bear at Katmai National Park and Preserve. The videotape has audio only; the screen remains blank for the three-minute recording.

"They're both screaming. She's telling him to play dead, then it changes to fighting back. He asks her to hit the bear," Hill said. "There's so much noise going on. I don't know what's him and what might be an animal."

Coming soon...

"The Bear Munch Project"

[Tijeras_Slim]

Gotta hand it to the guy, equiping himself with a "black box" before crashing and burning.

[ought-six]

"It's been a few years since I've been to Alaska, but I thought you were supposed to yell at grizzlies, and curl up for black bears. Is it the other way around?"

No, you just change the channel.

[Snowy]

"I'm fixing to bend over and eat some grass, I suggest you brace yourself".

LOL! ***tears*** Thanks for the laugh!