Slovak town declared state of emergency after 10-year-old girl became latest victim of series of bear attacks – with patrols ordered to ‘eliminate’ rampaging beast on sight.
The latest bear attack on Sunday, which took place in the town of Liptovsky Mikulas, injured a 49-year-old woman in the shoulder and a 72-year-old man with a gash in the head.
A 10-year-old girl and two other adults suffered scratches and bruises, authorities said, while a couple pushing their child in a stroller were “lucky to escape unharmed.”
Authorities have now declared a state of emergency.
Residents were asked not to leave their homes, especially early and late, as animal hunters arrived in the city to search for the bear.
New footage of a bear attack on Sunday in Liptovsky Mikulas, Slovakia, shows the huge beast pouncing through the streets.
The Slovak city has now declared a state of emergency. Authorities say: “We cannot allow a bear to attack five people in the center in broad daylight.”
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“The bear spent about 20 minutes in the city center, attacked five people and retreated into the woods,” Liptovsky Mikulas spokeswoman Viktoria Capcikova told AFP.
“They have at their disposal a drone equipped with thermal vision, night vision, camera traps and service weapons,” she added.
Six patrol groups made up of hunters, police and wildlife experts were trying to locate him around the city.
“The bear was pushed into uninhabited areas by rescue and security forces where emergency teams (…) were ordered to eliminate it,” the town hall said in a message published on Facebook.
“Hunters will be patrolling the risk area, police patrols have been increased, and brown bear emergency teams from across the country have been dispatched to our city and surrounding areas. A thermal imaging drone is also being deployed.
“We are a city between mountains, but still a city. We cannot allow a bear to attack five people in the center in broad daylight.
New footage of the bear shows it bounding through the streets of the Slovak town before heading to a body of water for a swim.
It comes just a day after a woman named Tatiana, 31, died after she and her friend were attacked by a brown bear in Slovakia.
The woman, from Belarus, was walking with a companion in the Low Tatras mountain range on Friday evening when they were chased by the predator.
According to the 29-year-old man, he and the woman fled in different directions while deep in the thick forest.
The woman’s body was discovered by Slovak mountain rescue services on Friday evening, while the bear was lingering nearby.
Local reports said the bear was quickly frightened by the sounds of gunshots fired by the rescue team.
According to the BBC, it was unclear whether the woman died trying to escape or was killed by the bear.
Slovak authorities assured that if she was mauled to death by the brown bear, they would reveal this information publicly.
Sunday’s attacks come just days after a 31-year-old woman was chased by a bear and died in Slovakia. It is unclear whether the woman died trying to escape or was killed by the bear.
The bear was seen running through the Slovak town and then bathing in the water during its violent rampage.
Bears are common in many parts of Eastern Europe, including areas surrounding the Carpathian Mountains, which extend from Romania to Poland and through Slovakia.
The researchers estimated that there are approximately 1,275 bears living in Slovakia.
There have been several bear attacks in Slovakia in recent years, including a fatal attack in 2021 – believed at the time to be the first in Slovakia in a century.
The body of a 57-year-old man was found on June 14 in the Banskô valley, in the Liptov region.
He was found in the forests above the village of Liptovská Lúžna with his head, hip and neck mutilated.
Fresh bear prints were found at the site.
Slovakia’s Environment Ministry issued guidelines on protective shooting of brown bears earlier this month, authorizing special teams to shoot any bears that pose a threat to humans.
The Minister of the Environment, Tomas Taraba, blamed NGOs and the Constitutional Court on Friday for the death of the Belarusian woman chased from the top of a cliff.
“According to a ruling of the Constitutional Court, it is prohibited to shoot bears on a large scale. I therefore congratulate the Constitutional Court. I hope you are satisfied with your work, it is also your work,” he told reporters after the attack.
Also on Friday, the ministry announced that it would submit, together with Romania, a proposal to the EU to reclassify the bear in a lower category of protected wild animals, which would allow more aggressive control of the bear population. bear.