A 250lb black bear was euthanised after it mauled a 10-year-old boy and then proceeded to drag his limp body across his grandfather’s lawn in Connecticut.
The Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) said EnCon Police and Connecticut State Police arrived at the scene of the attack at around 11am on Sunday in the town of Morris, located about 34 miles west of Hartford.
The child’s grandfather, James Butler, described to the Republican-American of Waterbury how his 10-year-old grandson had been playing out in the backyard when he was confronted by the large mammal, which was several times his size.
“I heard him yell ‘bear’ and when I looked up, I saw his leg in the bear’s mouth and the bear trying to drag him across the lawn,” Mr Butler said.
His attempts to steer the bear off, which included striking it with a metal pole, proved futile as after the boy was temporarily knocked out of the creature’s jaws, it once again seized upon, and this time attempted to turn the child onto his back.
At this point, Mr Butler’s next door neighbour became aware of the confrontation, telling NBC Connecticut how he’d begun hearing calls of “help, help, help” echoing from the backyard.
“I heard the 10-year-old boy saying ‘bear, bear, bear’ so I knew right then the bear must have gotten hold of him,” Jonathan Digimas told the local NBC affiliate.
Mr Digimas then set about relieving the child from the bear’s clutches, and also used a metal bar – specifically, a steel pipe – to fend off the massive mammal.
“I picked up the pipe and I threw it at the bear, I struck it in the head,” he told the news outlet. After successfully getting the 10-year-old out of the bear’s mandible, Mr Digimas said that the grandparents of the child were able to safely shepherd him inside.
Once the family was able to assess the damage, which, based on Mr Digimas’s assessment, included a bleeding foot and claw marks up and down his torso, he was rushed to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
Investigators from DEEP and local authorities confirmed that the same bear who had attacked the young boy was still at the scene when they arrived shortly after it had been called in on Sunday morning.
The bear, which was not tagged or known to the department, was euthanised by EnCon police shortly after they found it, NBC New sreported.
DEEP acknowledged that attacks of this nature, which they said was the most aggressive they’d seen this year, are rare, but residents should ensure that food and garbage are safely disposed of and secured ahead of collection.
“So that is the group of bears that has started to learn bad behaviour, those are the bears that lose their fear of people and the ones that start to associate people with a source of food,” said Director of Wildlife Division Jenny Dickson in an interview with NBC Connecticut.
“When you combine all of those things together that makes a large animal that has learned very bad behaviour, is wild and very unpredictable.”
Wildlife experts from DEEP warn that sightings of black bears have been on the rise recently because the population is steadily growing, which can in part be attributed to the urban sprawl brushing up against their native habitats.
In 2021, for instance, there were approximately 8,600 bear sightings across 156 of Connecticut’s 169 towns, DEEP reported.
The agency recommends being proactive when it comes to bears getting too cosy on your property and says the number one objective is keeping human food sources out of reach.
“Bears spend time in neighborhoods because food sources are abundant and easy to access (birdfeeders, garbage, open compost, grills, etc.),” the agency writes, noting that the same bears will be repeat offenders in your yard once they come to learn that it’s a reliable source of food.
If you do see a bear, the agency advises to watch from a safe distance a report the sighting to DEEP. But if that encounter happens while your outside and can’t easily access a safe space, the agency says to make noise, wave your arms, and throw objects at the bear.
“Black bears rarely attack humans. However, if you are attacked, do not play dead. Fight back with anything available,” DEEP advises.
