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67galaxie, Geo. Newbern, GLS, Stanton Hillis
Total Likes: 13
Original Post (Thread Starter)
by Argo44
Argo44
I keep worrying about this stuff because son spends a lot of time up there with nothing more than bear spray. He has an 870...but clearly you need something you can get out in a hurry and put rounds down range. "Bear moved too fast to use a gun"

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Allen Minish was alone and surveying land for a real estate agent in a wooded, remote part of Alaska, putting some numbers into his GPS unit when he looked up and saw a large brown bear walking about 30 feet away.

“I saw him and he saw me at the same time, and it’s scary,” he said by phone Wednesday from his hospital bed in Anchorage, a day after being mauled by the bear in a chance encounter.

The mauling left Minish with a crushed jaw, a puncture wound in his scalp so deep the doctor told him he could see bone, lacerations and many stitches after a 4½-hour surgery. He also is wearing a patch over his right eye, saying the doctors are worried about it.

All that damage came from a very brief encounter — he estimates it lasted less than 10 seconds — after he startled the bear Tuesday morning just off the Richardson Highway, near Gulkana, located about 190 miles (306 kilometers) northeast of Anchorage.

The bear, which Minish said was larger than 300-pound black bears he has seen, charged and closed the ground between them in a few seconds.

Minish tried to dodge behind small spruce trees. That didn’t stop the bear; he went through them.

As the bear neared, Minish held up the pointed end of his surveying pole and pushed it toward the bear to keep it away from him.

The bear simply knocked it to the side, the force of which also knocked Minish to the ground.

“As he lunged up on top of me, I grabbed his lower jaw to pull him away,” he said, noting that’s how he got a puncture wound in his hand. “But he tossed me aside there, grabbed a quarter of my face.”

“He took a small bite and then he took a second bite, and the second bite is the one that broke the bones … and crushed my right cheek basically,” he said.

When the bear let go, Minish turned his face to the ground and put his hands over his head.

And then the bear just walked away.

He surmises the bear left because he no longer perceived Minish as a threat. The bear’s exit — Alaska State Troopers said later they did not locate the bear — gave him time assess damage.

“I realized I was in pretty bad shape because I had all this blood everywhere,” he said.

He called 911 on his cellphone. While he was talking to a dispatcher, he pulled off his surveyor’s vest and his T-shirt and wrapped them around his head in an attempt to stop the bleeding.

Then he waited 59 minutes for help to arrive. He knows that's how long it took because he later checked his cellphone record for the length of the time he was told to stay on the line with the dispatcher until rescue arrived.

At one point, he was able to give the dispatcher his exact coordinates from his GPS unit, but even that was a struggle.

“It took awhile to give them that because I had so much blood flowing into my eyes and on to the GPS, I kept having to wipe it all off,” he said.

He said one of the rescuers called him a hero after seeing how much blood was on the ground.

Rescuers tried to carry him through the woods to a road that parallels the nearby trans-Alaska pipeline to meet an ambulance. That didn’t work, and he said they had to help walk him a quarter mile through swamps, brush and trees. From there, he was taken to a nearby airport and flown to Providence Alaska Medical Center in Anchorage by a medical helicopter. He is listed in good condition at Providence.

Before help arrived, he worried about the bear returning to finish him off. “I kept hearing stuff,” he said, but every time he tried to lean up to look around, he became dizzy from the loss of blood.

“He didn’t come back, and so I just lay there and worried about it,” he said.

Minish, 61, has had his share of bear encounters over the 40 years he’s lived in Alaska, but nothing like this. He owns his own surveying and engineering business, which takes him into the wild often.

“That’s the one lesson learned,” he said. “I should have had somebody with me.”

He left his gun in the vehicle on this job but said it wouldn’t have mattered because the bear moved on him too fast for it to have been any use.

He can now add his name to the list of six people he knows who have been mauled by bears in Alaska.

“I guess I feel lucky,” Minish said of his encounter with the bear, after someone told him it’s better than being dead.

“In all honesty, it wouldn’t have mattered either way. You know, if it killed me, it killed me. I had a good life; I’m moving on. It didn’t kill me, so now let’s move on to the other direction of trying to stay alive,” he said.
Liked Replies
by Stanton Hillis
Stanton Hillis
Gil and I hunt woodcock in wild hog territory. Bumping into them in the thick cane and stuff is a distinct possibility. They're there. I don't worry about Gil's plan. My legs are longer ............and I plan to leave him in the dust.
2 members like this
by Stanton Hillis
Stanton Hillis
A good friend was filming a TV hunting show in AK. He's a great outdoorsman and hunter, but wasn't carrying while filming. A local asked if he had a bear gun. He said no, that he was watching close. The local handed him a short barrelled .44 mag. revolver to keep while he was there. My friend hefted it and said he bet it kicked bad, being so lightweight. Local said son, you won't even notice it when its in a grizzly's mouth.
1 member likes this
by 67galaxie
67galaxie
Note to self.....Never hunt with Gil
1 member likes this
by GLS
GLS
Originally Posted by ellenbr
Originally Posted by Argo44
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Allen Minish was alone and surveying land for a real estate agent in a wooded, remote part of Alaska, putting some numbers into his GPS unit when he looked up and saw a large brown bear walking about 30 feet away.



The Poacher's gun folds up well & will fit in a backpack. Currently the Turks offer one in 0.410.


Serbus,

Raimey
rse

Both the Turkish Yildiz TK36 (.410) and TK 12 (12 ga.) are offered by Academy. They are lightweight (alloy actions) "knock-offs" of the old Beretta M412 folding series of single-shots. Gil
1 member likes this
by ellenbr
ellenbr
https://www.vintageguns.co.uk/magazine/the-poacher-s-companion

Here is the platform, top longarm.


Serbus,

Raimey
rse
1 member likes this
by canvasback
canvasback
Originally Posted by DmColonial
Originally Posted by GLS
I've always heard in bear country it's better to be with at least one other person. In that situation, big bore isn't required in a handgun. .22, .25 or .32 are sufficient. As the two of you flee from the bear, shoot friend in knee to slow him down.

Joke, but a Damn poor joke IMO

Damn poor sense of humour, IMO

Come on, buddy. Lighten up. By any metric, it’s a good joke. Classic structure, good delivery, on topic. The one problem with it is Gil tells it all the time.
1 member likes this
by craigd
craigd
Originally Posted by Stanton Hillis
Gil and I hunt woodcock in wild hog territory. Bumping into them in the thick cane and stuff is a distinct possibility. They're there. I don't worry about Gil's plan. My legs are longer ............and I plan to leave him in the dust.
I think GLS left out an important detail, make sure your buddy is faster than you, so you can get a clear shot grin
1 member likes this
by Parabola
Parabola
Some years ago I shot a Fallow doe with a .33 Winchester. I was crouching down finishing the gralloch ( she was too heavy for me to hoist into a tree) when a large black animal snuck up beside me and started chomping on the innards.

It gave me quite a fright until I remembered we don’t have bears in England, and realised it was my friend’s dog.
1 member likes this
by GLS
GLS
The Rinella interview and the reaction of those with him when the bear rushed in is the embodiment of the Mike Tyson statement: "Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth." I had such a moment woodcock hunting in wild hog territory. Abby had bayed a hog in the rivercane and fortunately she came when I whistled. I was in thick cane and laid my shotgun beside me while I went to one knee to leash Abby to get the hell out of Dodge. While leashing her, the sow charged. She must have been protecting her piglets. I saw her under 10 yards breaking cane as she ran towards me. I stood up, without the gun, and ran at her hollering with my arms up in the air waving. The thought of shooting her never entered my mind in the split second I reacted. Luckily, it was a bluff charge and she spun on her heels and ran away. If I did that with a charging brown bear the bear's first thought would be "I don't recall ordering this food delivery. How nice." Gil
1 member likes this
by GLS
GLS
Just this week I received an email from a friend about the border between Idaho and Washington being thick with mountain lions. Washington doesn't allow lion hunting but Idaho does. According to him, locals practice the three S's when it comes to lion safety. "Shoot, shovel and shut-up." I have friends that do the same when gators show up uninvited to their property. Gil
1 member likes this
by Cameron
Cameron
Actually, living about as close to the border of WA as one can, here in N ID, WA residents can hunt cougars! But WA did away, about a decade ago, of chasing cougars with dogs under much controversy. I suppose many hunters in WA now days purchase a cougar tag and manage to bag one incidental to big game hunting, with cougars being as elusive as they are.

I read the article in the Spokesman about the Bonner Ferry's hunter, he was a lucky puppy! I hunted brown/grizzly bears in AK, when I lived there and can vouch for the speed that they move. I never had any run ins with them and was thankful for that
1 member likes this
by Argo44
Argo44
Where a heavy revolver did save lives...but only one revolver, one (jammed) rifle, and a crossbow:

Eli Francovich, The Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Wash.
Sun, May 23, 2021, 11:01 AM
May 23—Trevor Schneider peered through his scope, a 1,000-pound brown bear made small by 1,410 feet of distance.

For Schneider, of Bonners Ferry, it was a reasonable shot. He's killed animals from farther, after all. He slowed his breathing, each breath condensing in the chill of the Alaskan evening.

It was 8 p.m. on May 13 and Schneider and his sister Tana Grenda were on their fourth day hunting coastal black bears on the southern side of the Alaskan peninsula.

They'd been dropped off by Grenda's husband along the beach on May 8, set up camp and promptly spent the next two days waiting out bad weather. When the skies cleared, they glassed the steep hillsides above them, eventually spotting a large brown bear they decided to stalk.

They left camp at 6 a.m. on May 13 and spent the next 14 hours hiking uphill, picking their way through thickets of alders and devil's club. Over the course of the final 2 miles they gained 2,000 feet of elevation, climbing through cliff bands, eventually topping out onto an alpine snow field. By 8 p.m., they'd traveled about 8 miles, crossing numerous streams, each carrying 50-pound backpacks.

That's where they saw their bear, one of many that had just come out of hibernation. In southern Alaska, these coastal brown bears grow big eating salmon. Unlike in the Lower 48, they are common animals. Already, Schneider and Grenda had passed by several large animals.

"They are salmon bears," Schneider said. "It's not like what we're used to in areas like North Idaho and Washington. You see bears like you see deer down here."

They closed in on the bear they'd spotted from the beach 8 miles below.

"We were going after a big one," he said. "We weren't going to shoot a small one."

He found his spot, 470 yards away, totally exposed on an open expanse of snow.

He aimed. Steadied his breath. And shot.

Once, twice and a third time. The .338 ultra mag (a large magnum cartridge good for long-distance shooting) pierced the bear's lung, the second high left on the animal's shoulder and the third through the bear's neck.

He tried to fire again, but his gun had jammed. Oh well, he figured, he'd fired three good shots on the bear.

Schneider examined his weapon to figure out what happened. Meanwhile, the bear started to move toward him. Schneider couldn't figure out what happened with his gun, and the bear, despite the three bullets, had zeroed in on them and was rapidly approaching.

They started to panic.

Bears are fast. An average member of the species can run 30 mph when threatened. For comparison's sake, Usain Bolt — the fastest human recorded — ran 27.78 mph when he set a record in the 100-meter run in 2009.

Bears are even faster going downhill on snow. They use their bodies "like a sled," Schneider said.

"He's working his way toward us and we're starting to panic," Schneider said. "I said, 'OK we have to run.' Basically, we have to buy time here."

They dropped their gear and headed downhill, angling toward three boulders, the only cover around. They got behind the boulders. The gun was still jammed. Grenda didn't have her own rifle.

This particular bear hunt in Alaska has specific rules. First, you can only apply for it every four years. Second, if you aren't a resident of Alaska the only way you can get a tag is by either hiring a guide (that costs) or going with a next of kin relative who is an Alaskan resident.

Grenda lives in Alaska, so, per the hunting regulations, she was Schneider's guide.

But also according to the rules, she was not allowed to shoot the bear.

The two opted to save weight and bring only one rifle, one bow and one pistol.

They made it to the rocks on the ridge line, but the bear continued to move forward. When it was about 150 yards away, the animal got "a hit of adrenaline like it almost took drugs."

"At that point it really started moving," Schneider said.

They ducked behind one of the boulders and Schneider pulled out his revolver, which held five .454 Casull rounds. He had five more rounds on his hip. Schneider, trying to stay crouched behind the rock, waited until the bear got closer.

He fired, aiming for the animal's face, but crouched as he was, he missed. He had four bullets left.

He stood up. Took aim.

"OK, I have four more shots," he said. "I have to make it count here.

"It's coming to us mouth open, huffing at a dead sprint."

His second shot hit the animal in the chest. At 5 yards he shot again, hitting the bear in its front shoulder.

That shot turned the animal, and it angled away from Schneider and his sister. He shot once more, hitting it broadside.

Schneider and his sister moved again, this time heading uphill and to the side, figuring it would be harder for the bear to get them. Once they put some space between them and the animal, they turned around and looked down. The bear had tumbled off the ridge, starting a small avalanche.

It wasn't moving.

Seeing this, Schneider and Grenda screamed — a howl of survival.

"We both thought we were going to die," Schneider said. "What is that going to feel like? Am I going to feel the pain of getting ripped apart?"

The two made their way back to the bear. Schneider poked it at least "30 times with my pistol" to make sure it was dead. As the adrenaline faded, Schneider sat on the ground, sick to his stomach.

The bear was huge, a 28 1/4 -inch skull and 10-foot-4.

"It looked like a prehistoric monster," he said.

The duo spent the next several hours skinning the animal and packing its pelt. They hiked down into the low country and spent a cold night sleeping under a tarp.

Schneider's pack weighed 150 pounds, he estimated. Grenda's was about 100 pounds.

The next day, they hiked back to their base camp on the beach. They did not pack out any of the bear meat.

"Their meat is very nasty," he said. "You're just required to take the hide and the skull for research purposes and stuff."

The final miles to camp were grueling, with both of them taking breaks every 50 to 100 yards.

"You take your body to failure and then you do it again and again and again," he said.

But they made it.

In retrospect, Schneider said they both should have had pistols and a backup rifle.

As for the jammed rifle, it was a freak accident. A spent cartridge had fallen into the front action, blocking the bolt from going all the way down.

"Super unlucky," Schneider said.

Schneider acknowledged the deadly truth of the situation. He and his sister barely escaped with their lives despite all the benefits of modern technology.

"We're nothing compared to these things," he said. "If you were to throw us out there with nothing, we don't stand a chance. The only way we stand a chance is with the technology and the tools."

The pure size of the animal, combined with the fact that it took seven high-powered bullets to kill it, underscored the power of nature and humanity's dependence on tools.

Schneider has realized this in the past. An avid hunter, he and his family run Stuck N The Rut, a popular YouTube hunting show. He's spent more time than most in the backcountry and has no illusions about his toughness relative to nature.

And yet, the encounter with the brown bear in Alaska drove the point home in a way nothing else had.

"It was a humbling experience in general to just have had that happen and to realize, 'OK we're not the top of the food chain,' " he said.

"When it comes down to it, we are weak. It doesn't take much for us to be hurt or injured."
1 member likes this

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