Bear attack in Pinetop

[billrquimby]

The White Mountain Independent yesterday published an interview of the guy who saved that woman's life. He lived in an area near the dumpster and heard her screaming just a few minutes after he had gone to bed. He jumped up, pulled on some clothes and rushed outside wearing slippers instead of shoes.

 

It was a good thing, because instead of running to where he heard the screaming, he decided to drive his SUV. When he saw that a bear had a woman down and was mauling her, he charged the bear with his vehicle while honking its horn continuously. The bear ran a short distance, then returned to the woman and mauled her again. He tried to keep his vehicle between the bear and the woman, but the bear returned at least one more time before he was able to get it to abandon its "kill."

 

The article said the woman's scalp was peeled back and that the bear had bitten her shoulder severely. Neighbors wrapped her head in towels to control the bleeding before EMTs arrived.

 

Bill Quimby

[.270]

some years ago i got into a tussle with a bear below military crossing on the black. he was probably less than 200 lbs. not a baby by any means but not a big ol' boar either. he was a male. he had harrassed me for a coulpe hours and i thought i finally ran him off and forgot about him. anyway the sob snuck up behind me and grabbed my stringer and pulled me over backwards. i thought i just tripped or something. as i started to roll over to stand up here is this stinkin' fish thief sittin' there with one o' my hard earned bass in his mouth. i got up on my knees and slugged him in the mouth and the dropped the fish and then started looking for it. i then proceeded to pound him mercilessly with rocks and ended up hitting him in the mouth with one that knocked off a buncha his teeth. i got a sprained ankle outta the deal and he lost some teeth but i got all my fish back. i limped on down the creek another mile or so and came across a really big, really fresh track. i had a pistol in my pocket but didn't want to shoot a bear on the rez so i said heck with it and limped back to the truck. at the time i thought it was kinda funny. i've never been much afraid o' black bears. the only thing they seem to want to do with people is get away. that is the wild ones. these welfare bears like the one that mauled this lady and the one i got in the fight with are the dangerous ones. this poor lady was just in the wrong place. she was probably out walking her pup so he wouldn't take a dump n their room and came across this welfare bear. molly butlers always has welfare bears in their dumpster. they get pretty smart and get used to easy food. i sure hope she recovers completely. had to be real traumatic. Lark.

[Coach]

The Black is loaded with bears. I've had several encounters there, but nothing as serious as .270. It is really kind of scary when they start following you around. I've had to toss off a fish before to give them something to work on while I back out.

 

The worst area seems to be at the Black River Crossing. Lots of trash, lots of fish "remnants". I've seen some huge bears in there. A couple years back I was hunting coues on the San Carlos and was glassing a canyon just South of the crossing and glassed up 2 bears within 15 minutes up in trees eating the juniper berries.

 

A year later I was fishing near the crossing and there was a bear going from car-to-car looking for food. He peeled off at least one car door and the owners came back to find him in the back seat of their Honda. My father-in-law later had to shoot at one trying to get into his pickup where he was sleeping.

 

Those guys are so unpredictable. Usually, they are so afraid of people, they're almost uncanny in their ability to slip away and hide. But when they get used to food sources produced by humans, they seem to loose their fear of people really quickly.

[.270]

i finally bought me a cheap stainless .357. put 3 snake loads in it and 3 hollowpoints. i never had to get to the hollowpoints. they hate snakeloads in the butt. sometimes down there you spend more time fighting with bears than you do fishing. the bears are accustomed to woofing and bouncing around on their front feet a little and folks drop all their fish and run off. this one i encountered got real cornfused when it didn't work with me. i don't think he had any intention of hurting me or even knowing how. he'd made an easy living on the river and never had to do anything violent. but the bears you have to worry about are the tame ones that hang around people. i've been around literally hundreds of bears. except for a few tame ones, the rest only wanted to get away. they hate people. bears are a neat animal. really cool to watch them. remind me a lot of dumb fat kid. always in trouble. but they can also take down a bull elk if they want to. hope this lady pulls through ok. personally, i'd love to have a big ol' bear claw scar on my face. what a conversation piece. women ain't that way. i wonder if the dog had anything to do with the attack? wonder if it barked at the bear or bit it or anything? Lark.