A video of a polar bear attack which was repelled with a couple of long sticks or pipes has been popping up, on and off, for a few years. It seems to have first appeared in 2020. Some sites claim the event happened in Quebec, Canada. Any help in identifying the location and person/people involved would be appreciated. The video is 12 seconds long.
The site in the video seems to be a research station of some type. There is an antenna mast, probably for communication, a rectangular shelter with a door at the corner, and what may be an instrument or communications mounting stub coming out of the roof at the left upper corner.
The charging bear is wary of the long pipe/stick that the man is pointing at the bear’s nose/chest. The long objects are likely some light metal pipe or conduit because of their uniform width, length (about 10 feet), and straight geometry. There is a dog in the video, which appears briefly on the middle left side.
The man with the poles/pipes shoves the end of the pipe at the charging bear, which abruptly puts on the brakes as it is hit by the pipe/pole. After retreating, the bear comes back. The man swings/flings the second pole at the bear, which hits the bear on the front legs. The bears retreat, and we do not see them anymore.
Consider if the man had a spear instead of a pole. The bear could have sustained a deadly chest wound if the man had used slightly different tactics at the beginning. If he had waited a fractional second for the bear to get a yard/meter closer and thrust into the chest cavity the blow could easily be deadly.
This video helps explain how the Russian sailors were able to kill 10 polar bears with lances/spears while they were shipwrecked on Svalbard in the 1740s. The sailors did not have a dog, but they had each other. A thrust from the side with a spear would be deadly.
Polar bears tend to be solitary, except for sows with a cub or cubs and pairs of bears during mating season. It is unclear which this pair is.
A spear/lance thrust to penetrate the lungs/heart of a bear is the best chance for a deadly strike. The heart/lungs are protected by the ribs/sternum, so a blade needs to be able to reach about 1-2 feet into the bear to inflict a deadly wound or to make more than one wound. The heart and lungs of bears are further back than on deer, and closer to the midline of the body. Any good hole to both lungs will probably kill the bear, often as quickly as a hole in the heart.
We do not know how the video was filmed. The frame follows the action but smoothly and with limited travel. It might be held by another human or remotely operated from inside the cabin/shelter.
From the study of the descriptions of polar bear predatory attacks on humans, this is a typical sort of polar bear attack. Because the bears are unfamiliar with the strange human prey, they do not charge all-out but are wary of possibly being injured, a form of prey-testing.
This gives humans a good opportunity to ready a weapon and mount an effective defense.
About Dean Weingarten:
Dean Weingarten has been a peace officer, a military officer, was on the University of Wisconsin Pistol Team for four years, and was first certified to teach firearms safety in 1973. He taught the Arizona concealed carry course for fifteen years until the goal of Constitutional Carry was attained. He has degrees in meteorology and mining engineering, and retired from the Department of Defense after a 30 year career in Army Research, Development, Testing, and Evaluation.
That would be a dicey situation to be in. But he’s in polar bear country so should not have been outside without a firearm. Anytime any animal gets the idea that you are the predator, not them, the animal will flee. That’s how a house cat can jump out of the bushes and chase a black bear down the trail. Fortunately for this man he convinced the bears that he was dangerous and that they were in danger. Perfect ending.
Great…now the bear spray people will claim that long sticks are all you need to scare off a bear! In addition to the spray, of course.
We have just seen video of a VERY LUCKY man. This guy should go buy some lotto tickets — quick. Both bears were plenty large enough to kill him and likely would have if he had not been armed with a couple of sticks??? I guess that you use what you got. Very few predators would have been run off so easily. As well as this turned out there is no question that I would have much rather had a handgun or rifle or shotgun instead of a couple of sticks. Predators, four and two legged, tend to be fast… Read more »
Being armed is better than not being armed.
I thinking two year twins.
Nothing that a good firearm would have taken of,
But then the paper work would have been the problem
In the days of yore, the favored method of boar hunting was to corner the boar with dogs, then the hunter would dismount and take a knee in front of the boar. He’d plant the base of a spear into the ground behind him and get the boar to charge, skewering itself on the spear point. Ballsy maneuver and you only got one shot at it. In this case, the bears look to be pretty young. My guess would be a pair of cubs just coming into maturity, still figuring things out, and not long separated from Mom. I don’t… Read more »
So the moral of the story is that if you don’t carry a gun (MORON) like John Wilks Booth, speak softly and carry a bunch of big sticks.
I would have used a pipe to prevent that attack, too. Mine would have been rifled, 45/100ths of an inch, and attached to an AR-15 upper. Gotta love that .450 Bushmaster.
Note that the first pole thrust at the bear became two poles. It must have been and extendable pole.
My interpretation of stick fighting is that you want to thrust and then withdraw the stick. That way you deliver the most impact energy over the smallest area. It may be that is what he did on the first attack and the pole separated. I don’t know why he threw on the 2nd attack.
To be in such a situation without two firearms seems risky.
HLB