California’s wildlife scene just got even wilder, folks, as a black bear decided to make a surprise live television appearance right behind a reporter covering a recent bear attack. This unexpected moment happened early on March 15 in Monrovia, Los Angeles County, where a local news crew was on the scene to report on a bear incident from the day before.
According to BroBible, KTLA reporter Erin Myers was busy delivering her segment when she got the heads-up that a bear had popped up in a driveway right behind her. It turns out this particular bear, which apparently has a cub, has been living under a nearby house for “several months,” according to a neighborhood resident Myers spoke with.
The bear even showed up near a trap that the Department of Fish and Wildlife had set up in the resident’s driveway. The camera stayed focused on the animal as it calmly roamed the area, though it’s not clear if this was the same bear responsible for the attack Myers was reporting on.
Encounters between people and wildlife seem to be on the rise in California
This live interruption highlights a growing concern in California – an increase in man-animal conflict. From mountain lions to bears, the number of cases are on the rise, becoming a serious cause for concern among residents. Just last year, there was the whole saga of a bear that hunkered down in a crawlspace under a home in Altadena for months before a volunteer had to evict it with a paintball gun. Now, a homeowner about ten miles east is dealing with a similar situation.
The incident Myers was covering involved a woman walking her dog on Oakglade Drive in Monrovia on Saturday. She became the first documented victim of a bear attack in California for 2026, receiving treatment for non-serious injuries after a bear charged at her and clawed the back of her knee before scurrying off.
While wildlife officials estimate there are upwards of 60,000 black bears in the state, attacks on humans are generally pretty rare, averaging a little over three per year. It’s a sobering thought that there had never been a confirmed fatality before a woman was tragically killed in 2023.
It seems like the wildlife here just loves the news cameras, because this isn’t even Myers’s first time sharing TV space with a bear. She mentioned that a similar situation unfolded last October when another bear crashed one of her reports.
It’s truly been a big year for animals interrupting local news segments across the Golden State. Back in January, a coyote strolled right through the shot as another reporter was covering a mountain lion that had been captured in the heart of San Francisco.
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