A bear tore through a military base and airport in Japan on Friday, injuring four people before it was shot dead.
As reported by The Washington Post, “[v]ideo footage showed the bear galloping across a busy road and pushing its way into a base run by Japan’s Self-Defense Forces.”
The animal was seen at around 3:30 in the morning and was reportedly spotted more times throughout the earlier hours of the day.
Public broadcaster NHK revealed video that “shows the bear scaling a fence at Sapporo Okadama Airport, a small airport serving flights around Japan’s northern island of Hokkaido. Eight flights at the airport were canceled, according to NHK, while 10 schools were closed in the city,” per the Post.
WATCH:
18日朝早く、札幌市東区の市街地にクマが出没し、警察によりますと、これまでに4人が襲われるなどしてけがをし手当てを受けているということです。https://t.co/Ke9blYLQZQ pic.twitter.com/VRZ4ZgP9V6
— NHKニュース (@nhk_news) June 18, 2021
【話題のニュース】
札幌でクマ出没 4人けが
陸自駐屯地に逃げ込む#テレ朝news #北海道 #クマ pic.twitter.com/gqUKBNIJXT— テレ朝news (@tv_asahi_news) June 18, 2021
Officials warned people in the area to stay in their homes as the bear made its way through the city of Sapporo in northern Japan, NBC News reported.
During a press conference on Friday, Japan’s chief cabinet secretary Katsunobu Kato stressed that people should remain in their homes and stay aware. He told the press that the animal had gotten into one of the country’s self-defense force military barracks and said that at least four people had been injured.
“We pay our condolences to the people affected in the Sapporo city,” he said.
Japan’s public broadcaster NHK also reported that flights were affected and some local schools also shut down to protest the students.
According to an online English translation of the NHK news service’s reporting, Professor Emeritus Koji Kanagawa of Hokkaido University, who knows about the ecology of brown bears, said, “I think it is a young brown bear with a strong curiosity because it haunted the city. However, it is important to be aware that you live in the place where the bear is.”
After that, per NHK, “Because bears that cause harm to humans will return once they are returned to the mountain, it is unavoidable to exterminate them. As a countermeasure, cut down the abandoned fruit trees that feed the bears or leave garbage. It’s about not being disturbed. “
Shinsuke Koike, a professor and expert on bears at Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, said, “It’s hard to properly understand what happened, but knowing that the bear is male, and given that it is the breeding season right now, it’s highly conceivable that the male was chasing after a female bear, and in the process wandered into a residential area.”
“All over Japan, areas where bears are living are expanding more and more, to the point of bears living right behind people’s backyards,” Koike noted.
Bear attacks have also been reported in the United States over the past several months. As The Daily Wire reported in May, a man in Alaska survived a bear mauling said he feels “lucky” to have lived through the ordeal.
The incident was at least the third bear attack this year after recent attacks resulted in the death of two people. One woman was killed by a bear in Colorado while she was walking her dogs, and a backcountry guide was killed near Yellowstone National Park in Montana.