A brave man slugged a black bear right in the snout after it entered a British Columbia home.
Last Saturday, Eleri Froude was at home in Gibsons, which is at the southern end of the Sunshine Coast, when a black bear wandered in through an open glass sliding door.
At the time, Froude was with her two young sons, and a family friend helping with home renovations. She became aware of the bear when her son, Ivany, said clearly “Mom, look” and motioned to the bear in their dining room.
“The black bear was drooling on my table about two feet away from my son,” Froude told the Vancouver Sun.
The family friend instructed Froude to take her sons into the bedroom and lock the door. The friend started banging pots, shouting and shaking chairs in an attempt to scare the bear back outside. After that didn’t work, the man punched the bear square in the nose, causing the bear to retreat though the same glass door it entered.
The man quickly locked the sliding door as the bear continued to chew and claw at it.
“I’ve got teeth marks all up and down my door,” says Froude. “He took the screen door right off.”
When the Sunshine Coast RCMP arrived, the bear was still at the door.
“Police scared the bear into the bushes with air horns and by throwing water bottles at it,” said Karen Whitby of the Sunshine Coast RCMP in a release. “Shortly after though, the bear returned to the house and tried to open the door to the garage.”
The family friend once again tried to scare the bear away while it tried to break into the garage, but it chased him down the street before he could jump into his truck parked around the block.
After determining that the bear lacked a fear of humans, the RCMP shot and killed the bear.