[at-l] FYI Bear Attacks

[RoksnRoots@aol.com (RoksnRoots@aol.com)]

FYI: Black bear attacks


Black Bear Mauls Arizona Camper 



May 2, 2001 A 311-pound black bear has been trapped and killed after 
attacking a sleeping camper in Arizona's Santa Rita Mountains. 

Twenty-three-year-old Cody Fickett was in a sleeping bag on the open ground 
next to his brother Jason, 25, when the attack took place early Sunday 
morning some 40 miles southeast of Tucson. When he awoke, he was flying 
through the air, his neck in the bear's mouth. 

Waking seconds later, Jason Fickett saw his brother being dragged along the 
ground toward some nearby bushes. He scrambled out of his sleeping bag and 
began to yell and punch the animal. When the bear didn't immediately let go, 
Cody thought he was going to die. 

"We've been camping and caving in this area with our baby numerous times," 
says Reesa Fickett, Cody's wife, who had stayed at their Tucson home with 
their eight-month-old son since caving was on the brothers' agenda. "We'd 
never even seen a bear." 

Joan Scott, habitat program manager for the Tucson office of the Arizona Game 
and Fish Department, confirms that such attacks are rare in southeastern 
Arizona. The last such incident in the region took place in 1996. 

After Jason Fickett had shouted, pushed and punched at the bear for several 
minutes, the animal relented, depositing a bleeding Cody on the ground, but 
remaining in the campsite. The pair got into Cody's four-wheel-drive vehicle 
and began the 15-mile drive on a rutted road to the nearest town. "Jason 
didn't even know how to drive a stick," says Reesa Fickett. 

When they arrived in Sonoita, Cody Fickett was airlifted to the Tucson 
Medical Center, where he was treated for eleven puncture wounds, a severed 
artery, and multiple neck fractures. He was kept overnight and released; a 
full recovery is expected. 

After an autopsy of the bear found food wrappers in its stomach, Arizona Game 
and Fish officials concluded the attack may have been prompted by food left 
out in nearby campsites. Nevertheless, Scott says destroying an aggressive 
bear is standard practice. "When we have a bear that has shown aggression 
toward people, we eliminate it. We have people who want us to do more and 
people who want us to do less, but that's our usual procedure." 


   
 

 


------------------------------------------------------------------------------

--