An incident in which a man was attacked by a bear while out for a run may share a key detail with another recent high-profile bear attack that proved fatal.
Bill Palas, a resident of Asheville, North Carolina, went for a run July 7 in Pisgah National Forest, which runs up to the back of the home where he has lived for 30 years. At one point during the run, Palas encountered a baby bear that was sitting in the middle of the trail he was using, according to reports that began to emerge Monday. Taken by surprise, the cub took off running up a nearby hill.
"When you see a cub like that, there's usually a mom around," Palas said. "So, I go and I turn around real quick—and all of a sudden, there I see the momma bear."
He initially attempted to ward off the mother bear by waving his arms around and yelling as it charged at him. The animal seemed to divert away from him for a moment, before realizing that he was standing between her and her cub.
"She stands up on her back legs, and here's this head, her head must have been the size of a basketball, and it's right here," Palas said. "She takes her claw and she rakes it across my face and chest."
The bear knocked Palas to the ground after his arm ended up in its mouth as he attempted to defend himself. From that point, the animal shifted focus to its cub, allowing Palas to make a run for it.
Bear attacks like the one in Asheville are considered extremely rare, with the National Park Service estimating that they occur in only one out of every 2.7 million park visits.
Despite those statistics, an unusually high number have been reported in recent months, with incidents cropping up in Arizona and Colorado, as well a similar one more than 1,800 miles away from Pisgah National Forest.
On Saturday morning, park rangers in the Montana portion of Yellowstone National Park found the remains of 47-year-old Amie Adamson of Derby, Kansas. She had been working in the area for the summer and was taking a morning walk in the park prior to her death. Grizzly bear tracks were seen near the body, and it is suspected that Adamson's encounter, like that of Palas, involved a mother bear.
Newsweek reached out to the National Park Service via email for comment.
