A Kaska woman is sharing a hair-raising tale of survival after being attacked by a grizzly bear near the town of Haines Junction, Yukon.
Vanessa Chaput says she was out for a run on June 30 near the village, 155 km west of Whitehorse, when she came across three grizzly bears.
“I was right beside them and it was just too close,” she recalled in an interview with APTN News.
Chaput says she grew up in bear country and knows what to do during an encounter. The Kaska or Kaska Dena are First Nations people living mainly in northern British Columbia and southeastern Yukon.
“I have a really good respect for them,” she said of the apex predators, “just because growing up with my dad and everything. When you go hunting you’re in bear country, things are going to happen. And we have run into bears in the past.
“But I’ve never run into something like this before.”
Chaput says she tried to give the bears some space but her dog, Luna, got off the leash and chased two of the bears away.
The third – a male – then charged at her.
“When the bear had taken me down with my head in its mouth, my first thought was just kind of protect your vitals, so I went straight into the fetal position,” she said.
Chaput was wearing a plastic hair clip that broke in the bear’s mouth.
She believes it stunned the bear who let her go.
Once free she says she quickly ducked behind a tree.
“I was able to get in-between and the bear ran in-between the willows. I was watching him and he turned around and charged back at me.”
The bear then turned his attention to Luna who was barking, Chaput said.
“If it wasn’t for my dog barking, the bear was going to come finish the job.”
While the bear was distracted, Chaput says she made her way towards the highway.
“I looked at my body and I’d seen my arm and I had blood coming down my face, so actually my one eye had gone red from the blood,” she said. “I knew I was bleeding heavily and that I needed to get help, so I didn’t run.
“I just kept my eye towards where the bear had gone and then I walked up onto the highway.”
Chaput called 911 and her husband, who came and picked her up.
The nearby campground was evacuated and that weekend conservation officers euthanized three bears that matched the description from the attack.
The area where the attack happened has since been mulched and rain has washed away the blood.
Chaput spent a couple of weeks recovering in hospital.
“I have puncture wounds all up in my arm. I have a broken bone,” she said. “I have a lot of nerve damage in that area and then my tricep was torn in two places.”
She says she doesn’t feel any animosity towards the bears and hope others can learn from her story.
“I don’t blame the bears for what happened,” she said. “I don’t blame my dog or myself.
“It was wrong place at the wrong time. Again, it could have happened to anybody.”
