Man Mauled By Large Brown Bear, Suffers Crushed Jaw And Punctured Scalp

KEY POINTS

A 61-year-old Alaska man was attacked by a brown bear he said was larger than the 300-pound black bears he's seen
He called 911 after the mauling and waited an hour before rescuers arrived to transport him to a hospital
The man sustained many injuries throughout his body and had to undergo surgery for four and a half hours

A 61-year-old man from Anchorage, Alaska, was attacked by a large brown bear Tuesday, leaving him with multiple injuries.

Allen Minish was surveying land for a real estate agent just off Richardson Highway near the small community of Gulkana when he spotted the animal approximately 30 feet away from him, the Associated Press first reported.

"I saw him and he saw me at the same time," Minish recounted from his hospital bed in Anchorage.

The attack left him with a crushed jaw, lacerations and a puncture wound in his scalp that was so deep the doctor said he could see bone. Minish also received many stitches after a four-and-a-half-hour surgery. Further, doctors are concerned over Minish's right eye, which he has covered with a patch.

Minish said the bear, which he claimed was larger than the 300-pound (136-kilogram) black bears he had seen before, charged in and closed the distance between them in a matter of seconds. Minish held up the pointed end of his surveying pole and pushed it toward the bear in an attempt to keep it away from him, but the bear simply knocked it off to the side.

The force of the blow knocked Minish to the ground, where the bear lunged at him and started its assault.

According to Minish, the mauling lasted less than 10 seconds, but he was bit several times all over his body. Minish said he thinks the bear stopped and left after believing he was no longer a threat.

Minish called 911 on his cellphone after the attack and then waited for nearly an hour for help to arrive. He said he struggled to stay on the line with the dispatcher and provide them with his exact location because so much blood was flowing into his eyes and into his GPS device.

Once they arrived, one of the rescuers supposedly called Minish a hero after seeing the amount of blood on the ground.

Rescuers attempted to carry Minish through the woods to a road to meet with an ambulance but failed. They instead had to help him walk a quarter of a mile (0.4 kilometers) through swamps, brush and trees. A medical helicopter then took him to a nearby airport and flown to Providence Alaska Medical Center in Anchorage, where he is now listed in good condition.

Minish said he feels lucky to have survived the ordeal but added, "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."